AmeMite II: The Seven Mysteries
by DezoPenguin
Summary: The second entry in the slice-of-life "Ame no Murakumo ga Miteru" series; now openly dating Chikane, can Himeko deal with teaming up with Miya-sama's lead fangirl on a class project?
1. Chapter 1

_A/N: This story is the second full-length entry in the "Ame no Murakumo ga Miteru" series, which can best be described as "Chikane and Himeko's life after _Kannazuki no Shimai _is a slice-of-life story." The first story is called "Red String," and if you haven't read it already I'd suggest that you check that one out first!_

_Similarly to that story, because these are Japanese characters in a Japanese setting, I'm doing my best with using honorifics (mind you, Alice and Arrow both will omit them on the slightest pretext) and similar forms of address (I even ran a reader poll while "Red String" first went up, and you folks voted that I continue it). Please feel free to point out the inevitable places where I screw up completely!_

_This story is dedicated to my friend Fuyu no Sora, without whom you probably wouldn't be reading this. I actually began it back in 2010, not long after finishing "Red String," set it aside for a while, and did more in 2011. I shared the parts of the story I had done with my friends, and Sora in particular offered considerable commentary and review of various aspects of the plot and characters and small details that had slipped my mind over time but not escaped her attention. You know you're getting an in-depth review when the word count of the review exceeds that of the actual chapter! So one of the reasons I've been motivated to return to this story and finish it was a desire to let Sora find out how it ends, especially given how she's been so much help in piecing things together. ^_^  
><em>

~X X X~

Sometimes, Himemiya Chikane decided, selfishness wasn't a bad course of action. In this case, for example, selfishness would have been to sneak off with her girlfriend, Kurusugawa Himeko, to their secret spot in the rose garden and spend lunchtime together with her, just the two of them. Preferably spending most of the time kissing and leaving most of lunch uneaten. If she had done that, they'd be there now. Instead, rather than give in to selfish desire, they were going to eat lunch with their friends and because of that when Chikane had gone to get her lunch basket, Himeko had been cornered alone by three of her fellow classmates.

"This is simply unacceptable, Kurusugawa-san!" shrilly exclaimed the leader of the three girls, her blonde drill-curls bouncing with her emotion. "A nobody like you, a new transfer student, dragging Miya-sama down with your perversions?"

"Miya-sama is the shining idol of our school!" chimed in a second girl, who had a brown braid and glasses.

"Do you think we'll stand for it? Miya-sama may be too kind to tell you the truth, but even if she takes pity on you, there are others who won't," snapped the third girl, who had green hair.

That was more than enough, Chikane decided. She stepped out from around the rack of vending machines and rapidly strode towards the three girls. Himeko caught sight of her approach and gestured, trying to wave her off.

_Don't worry, love,_ Chikane thought. _I'm not going to do anything crazy_.

"Are you ignoring us, Kurusugawa-san? We're having an important conversation here!"

"It's not that, Kisaragi-san," Himeko replied nervously. A casual bystander might have assumed that it was the bullies making her nervous, but Chikane knew better. Himeko was no doubt recalling incidents of their two previous lives, incidents when Chikane had expressed her opinion of those who would threaten Himeko.

The green-haired girl, Misaki, turned her head to see what Himeko was looking at and had the experience of coming face-to-face with Chikane.

"M-M-M-Miya-sama!" she yelped. _Because she was startled? Because she knows what she's doing is wrong and was ashamed to be caught at it?_ Chikane strongly doubted that one. _Or perhaps my expression is not so controlled as I would like it to be._

"Good day, Ozawa-san," she said to the girl with deceptive mildness, then as the others turned, added, "Kisaragi-san, Mifune-san. I am deeply gratified to hear that I can place my romantic future in the hands of such diligent and generous matchmakers. Why, I find myself positively overwhelmed by your kindness. To think that you would do this for me, all without ever being asked, or indeed without us exchanging more than a word in passing, that is selflessness indeed. And to think, that without your gracious intervention I might have been led astray by the intensity of my own emotions, by the deep love I feel for Himeko, and, of course, the trust I foolishly placed in my parents' judgment in approving of a suitable girlfriend."

Continuing to advance on them, she withdrew an embossed envelope bearing the Himemiya family seal from her basket and extended it to Himeko.

"Speaking of my parents, Himeko, Okaasama wanted me to pass on her invitation to your family to join us for an informal dinner this Sunday."

Himeko took the envelope.

"Th-thank you, Chikane-chan." She still looked a little nervous, probably because she'd noticed that Chikane hadn't stopped advancing on the girls. Misaki and Kyoko had stepped aside, but Chikane kept on towards Otoha, making the blonde back up step by step until her back met the wall.

"A piece of friendly advice, Kisaragi-san," she said softly, her face but inches from her fangirl's. She let the mask drop, then, her expression reflecting exactly what she was feeling. "I would be careful on stairs if I were you. My experience has been that pushy, aggressive busybodies tend to be reckless in rushing about where they're not wanted and often have...accidents."

"Th-thank you, Miya-sama," Otoha stammered, unconsciously echoing Himeko.

"Do remember it." She forced the smile back in place. "As student council president, I would hate to see something happen to a classmate because I was remiss in properly advising them." She turned and extended a hand to her girlfriend. "Shall we go to lunch, Himeko?"

They walked off, leaving the three fangirls staring after them, still a little unsure of what had just happened.

Himeko, on the other hand, _was_ sure and _wasn't_ happy about it.

"You went too far, Chikane-chan."

"And yet, I feel like I didn't go far enough. How _dare_ they cause trouble for you?"

"If you'd just left off with what you told them at first, that would have been fine," she chided. "You did a very nice job of shaming them, and even I noticed how you brought in your parents' names to provide extra evidence of how far they'd gotten out of line. You didn't need to threaten Kisaragi-san, too."

"They were my honest feelings," Chikane protested. "I'm not going to let you be bullied or pushed around."

"You threatened to kill her! And you _meant_ it!"

"Not really," Chikane protested.

"Do you know what the word 'yandere' means, Chikane-chan?"

"No..."

"Well, you never were a manga reader," Himeko noted. "It means someone who goes violently insane for the sake of love. They attack or even murder threats or love rivals..."

Chikane winced.

"..become jealously possessive, wanting nothing more than a world where only the two of them exist..."

Chikane winced again.

"...and sometimes even go so far as to kidnap or sexually assault their love interest if things aren't moving fast enough for their tastes!"

Chikane smacked her forehead with her empty palm and groaned. Himeko burst into giggles.

"Strangely, I find myself attracted to that type," she said, then leaned up and kissed Chikane on the cheek. "Come on, let's go to lunch. Arrow-chan is probably half-finished already!"

~X X X~

"Now, for the next edition, I'd like if we could do something of local interest. We have ideas for stories about the people at the academy, but what about the academy itself?"

Kisaragi Otoha was barely paying attention to the editor of the school newspaper, the Newspaper Club president. That was extremely out of character for her, given that she'd joined the club in the first place _because_ Nanase Saya was the editor. Tall, elegant, beautiful, Saya had a lot in common with Himemiya Chikane. Indeed, she was the daughter of Mahoroba's second-wealthiest family, although the Nanase family didn't have the history of the Himemiyas or Ohgamis. Otoha's admiration for her had always been nearly as great as what she felt for Miya-sama. Her elegance, her serenity of manner, her poise, the slight angularity of her face giving it just enough character to be really beautiful instead of having cookie-cutter prettiness, her sleek figure with enough of a curve at breast and hip to be unmistakably womanly without the overripeness of the _gravure _models the boys would drool over...

_Ah! No, stop it!_ Otoha protested to herself when she recognized where her thoughts were going. _That isn't right! I'm not like that Kurusugawa girl, I'm not!_ She'd seen the looks the strawberry blonde gave Miya-sama, all but undressing her with her eyes. Miya-sama was everyone's ideal. It wasn't right to think about her that way, about kissing her, touching her—

And yet, Otoha found herself forced to admit, it wasn't just that Kurusugawa thought that way about Miya-sama, but that Miya-sama felt that way back! That she _liked_ that sort of thing! To touch another girl, to hold her and kiss her, and maybe even...

She choked off her traitorous thoughts before they went too far in that direction. If Miya-sama wanted to lower herself to the level of a commoner, entering into a wholly inappropriate relationship, then didn't that just prove that she wasn't worthy of Otoha's devotion? Wasn't that it, what had her upset—the scales dropping from her eyes?

That _was_ it, wasn't it?

At least staying away from Kurusugawa would be easy enough. She never wanted to see either of them again, let alone talk to them! It would be...would be...

"Kisaragi-san?"

It at last penetrated the frenzy of her thoughts that Saya was calling her name.

"Yes, Nanase-_buchou_?"

"What do you think about the story idea?"

Her voice brushed across Otoha like silk, commanding her attention. Despite being in a crowded room, it was as if only the two of them were present, in a private connection.

Otoha bit her lip nervously.

"I'm sorry, Nanase-_buchou_, but I let my attention wander. Could you repeat the idea?"

"It was suggested that, as a lighthearted piece of school interest, that we do an article on the 'Seven Mysteries of Ototachibana Academy,' with research into which ones are real and which might be urban legends, designed to fill out the list at seven." She didn't snap or get angry with Otoha's inattention, but there was a wistful disappointment in her voice that made the blonde feel ashamed, like she had just crushed a flower underfoot or torn up a piece of artwork.

"That could be fun," Otoha said. "I like the aspect of researching the backgrounds. Every time you hear about the mysteries of a school or other place, it's always seven, so it'd be interesting if people started making them up to fill out the list."

"Are you sure you weren't listening, Kisaragi-san?" asked the assistant editor, a third-year boy named Takara. "'Cause that's pretty much exactly what I said when I suggested it."

Otoha flushed hotly and more than one of the other club members laughed, but Saya wasn't among them.

"Now, Takara-san, that wasn't nice," she chided. Saya apparently had the same kind of effect on him as she did on Otoha, because he at once looked sheepish and ran his hand through his short, light-brown hair.

"Sorry, Kisaragi-san."

"No, it was my fault, Takara-sempai; I should have been more attentive to the meeting."

Saya smiled at them both.

"Now, it was decided last week that we would be working with a member of the Photography Club on one of this issue's stories, and I believe this one would be good. Taking photographs of the sites of the 'seven mysteries' could allow opportunities for artistic composition suited to the kind of work a club member works on doing. If you would invite them in?"

One of the girls opened the door, and karma rose up to smack Otoha in the face.

"My name is Kurusugawa Himeko. I'm pleased to be working with your club."

~X X X~

"Oh, man, you went and assigned the queen fangirl to work on a story with Himeko?" Ohgami Shizuka laughed.

"I didn't know whom it was the Photography Club had sent!" Saya protested.

The two friends were walking down the long staircase that led from Ototachibana Academy to the base of the hill. Shizuka was a tomboy through and through: tall, broad-shouldered, with short, unruly dark hair and a face that was more handsome than pretty. She played against stereotypes in multiple ways: she was the daughter of the priest of the Ohgami Shrine, and her nickname was Arrow because unlike all of her closest friends she was as straight as one.

"I didn't even know that Kurusugawa-san was _in_ the Photography Club. Isn't she on the kendo team?"

"Oh, yeah, that's right; you had that family thing last weekend, when she asked about it. She really likes photography, and the rules say a person can belong to two clubs if they get approval from both. Since Himemiya's the kendo team captain that was one approval there, and the Photography Club president agreed right off, too, on Monday morning."

"I just feel so embarrassed. And what's worse is that I'd had to chastise Kisaragi-san just moments before, for being inattentive in the meeting, so I'm afraid she thinks that I did it to punish her. Plus, what about Kurusugawa-san? She'll be so hurt."

"Ah, relax. Himemiya knows you didn't mean a thing by it, and she'll explain it to Himeko. No, what you need to worry about is if Alice laughs so hard her spleen comes out her nose when she hears this story."

"Hey, somebody taking my name in vain?"

Arms clamped around Saya from behind as a short girl with a startling red ponytail glomped onto her. Saya yelped and swayed; Arrow stuck out her arm suddenly in case they were in danger of falling, but the new arrival had her body weight under control so that she actually steadied herself and Saya in mid-pounce.

"Arisu-san!" Saya wrestled her way free. "Stop that!" Dropping her voice to just barely above a whisper she added she added, "What if somebody gets the wrong idea?"

"You're no fun," Alice Ishida pouted. Everybody knew the irrepressible girl was originally Canadian and that she'd been Chikane's best friend nearly ever since she moved to Japan when she was eight. What nobody other than Arrow, Chikane, and Himeko knew was that Alice and Saya were dating—and Saya wanted to keep it that way. "I glomp my friends all the time. I've glomped Miya so much it'll take Himeko a year to catch up on skinship."

"Well, don't," Saya snapped.

"Things are tough at home?" Alice asked, lowering her voice so that it wouldn't be overheard by the other students on the stairs.

"Yes; my parents did not take Himemiya-san's coming out well at all, and it was even worse because her parents are openly supportive of her. They argued for several hours, and revisited it more than once, over the question of whether they, and I, should drop the Himemiyas socially."

"Wait, they want you to cut Himemiya at school because she's gay?" Arrow boggled. "What a couple of jerkasses."

"Well, they finally settled on not doing that, because they were more concerned with not offending the Himemiya family than with enforcing their own beliefs."

"Yeah, I can see that," Alice decided. "Figured it was too risky to try the 'see, _we_ really _do_ stand for traditional values while the Himemiyas are just old' routine to make a grab for community leadership?"

"I believe so. It helped to settle their minds when the Ohgamis chose to carry on like nothing had happened."

"My dad's cool like that."

"Especially for a priest," Alice noted.

"Hey, now, just because there's a fair whack of jerks in religion doesn't mean religion itself is bad."

"Yeah, you're right. Sorry, Arrow."

"S'ok; we're good."

"They're really on edge about it, though," Saya continued. "What with Himemiya-san turning out to be a lesbian, and they're half convinced that Arrow-san is one, too—"

"Irony, gotta love it."

"—and given that Arisu-san is a very casual girl with her foreign ways, I'm afraid that my parents will seize on anything to claim that my friends aren't suitable companions for the daughter of the Nanase family."

"Yeah, after all, the family's got glorious history and tradition that reaches all the way back to last Tuesday," Arrow snorted. Alice didn't laugh, though, and Saya had no trouble figuring out why.

"I'm really sorry, Arisu-san. I wish there was something we could do, but if my parents ever found out..."

"I wish we could just tell _my_ parents. I know _they_ wouldn't mind; my mom actually cheered right there in the living room when I told them about Miya and Himeko."

"I can't risk it, Arisu-san. Don't you understand? All it would take would be one word out of place! I wish that you hadn't told Kurusugawa-san; she isn't very discreet."

"If you mean she can't lie to save her life, well, yeah, but I kind of had to. I mean, you don't want her finding out by accident and gasping 'Alice and Saya are dating!' at the top of her voice because she's so startled, do you? And she'd find out, too, because Miya tells her everything."

Saya exhaled heavily.

"I know. I know you're right; it's just that I get so nervous. I care so much that I can't let go and give them what they want, but then I worry about them finding out and what they'd do..."

"I...I understand, Saya. I know what you're going through. I just...Well, you know me. Secrets aren't my thing." She brightened then and said, "So hey, what is it I'm going to laugh about?"

"Oh, yeah! Get this, Alice; you won't believe who our editor-in-chief here paired up to do a story!"

Saya just groaned.

~X X X~

"I'm home!" Himeko called as she changed out of her shoes in the foyer of the house. She still wasn't used to her new home in terms of where all the doors led or that she didn't have to go to a public bathhouse if she wanted a soak instead of just a shower, but even so it definitely felt like "home" to her. Maybe it was because her whole family was there, or maybe because they were in Mahoroba, where the Solar Priestess had spent so many lifetimes. Either way, it was a warm, nostalgic feeling.

She followed the scent of sesame oil into the kitchen.

"Mmm, that smells great, Okaasan." Himeko caught sight of the noodles ready to be added into the stir-fry. "Soba? Isn't Otousan coming home for dinner?"

Kurusugawa Eiko shook her head.

"No, he called and said that he and several of his co-workers would be going to a sports bar in town for the game." She smiled at her daughter. "I immediately seized the chance to make soba!"

Himeko grinned back. Her parents shared many important opinions on life goals, ethics, values, and politics, but on soba noodles they found no common ground; Eiko's family ran a noodle restaurant, and her husband couldn't stand soba.

"Who's playing?" she asked.

"It's the Marines against the Buffaloes."

"Oh, so it's the newcomer from Chiba against the locals!" Himeko laughed, knowing how passionate her father was about sports generally and the Chiba Lotte Marines in specific. She could only imagine what it would be like at the bar.

"Exactly, so Hajime will have to cheer four times as hard to make up for it. But how did your day go?"

"Well, the Photography Club assigned me to take pictures to go with a story the Newspaper Club is doing on the Seven Mysteries of Ototachibana Academy." That should be pretty fun.

"The 'Seven Mysteries'? That's interesting; the kids always used to talk about the Seven Mysteries of the high school your father and I attended."

Himeko thought about that.

"That's interesting. You sometimes see it come up in manga, too, when there are seven mysteries at a school. I wonder if that means it's a kind of urban legend. Saya-san said something about finding if some of the stories are made up to fill out a list, so that's probably it, that there are supposed to be seven mysteries as part of the story." Belatedly, she remembered that in at least half of those stories, a horrible fate was supposed to overcome anyone who found out all seven mysteries, and wondered if that was part of Ototachibana's story as well.

_I hope not; that's kind of scary!_ she thought. A moment later, she realized how silly it seemed that the Shrine Maiden of the Sun, who'd fought Yamata no Orochi, would be scared of ghosts. _Not that it ever helps me on horror movie night_, she thought ruefully. _Wait—if there is a ghost, does that mean that as a priestess I'm supposed to exorcise it? This is more complicated than I thought!_

"I think so. Well, it certainly sounds like fun, and you've always had a good eye for artistic composition. The Photography Club seems much more like you than the kendo team."

"Well, that was mostly Chikane-chan's idea. Arisu-chan says we have a chance at being nationally ranked this year! Nobody's scored a point off Chikane-chan since junior high, and Oomori-sempai and Hachibe-sempai are both really good as well. Oomori-sempai's been really nice about teaching me the rules; I'm just afraid I'll get so nervous in a match that I forget and commit a foul." She pouted and added, "I wish Otousan was a kendo fan instead of baseball and sumo; I have all the rules of those sports memorized just because he watches them on TV!"

Her mother couldn't help but laugh, though the smile quickly faded.

"Still...Himeko, are you sure that this is for you? Are you sure that girl isn't just keeping you around to cheer for her?"

"Oomori-sempai is ranked as a 4-dan, Okaasan, and I beat her nearly every time in our practice matches, except when I forget the rules." She said it sheepishly, because it sounded a little like bragging, especially as she did feel a sense of pride. It was, after all, the first time in her life—several lives, actually—she'd been praised for something physical or athletic, and that was exciting.

Eiko's eyes widened slightly. Himeko felt a little bit sorry for her mother: the move to Mahoroba had been a big enough change to confuse anyone, and it had been rapidly followed up by multiple revelations from her daughter. In retrospect, Himeko wished that she'd revealed her interest in girls earlier, so that it wouldn't have been so surprising when she started dating Chikane.

"Oh! That reminds me; Chikane-chan gave me something to deliver to you." She got out the envelope, which was all done up in fancy style. Chikane's mother, she had a feeling, had fun putting on a show and playing games with appearances. Of the four parents, she was the one who was openly supportive of the girls' romance, unlike the fathers (who didn't necessarily like the idea but accepted the facts and were determined to make the best of things as they were) or Eiko (who was still having trouble with the idea that this wasn't just a phase and was confused that the other adults assumed it could be more than that). "It's a dinner invitation from the Himemiyas."

"Dinner? Oh, my word; I don't have anything I can wear!"

"I don't think it's supposed to be a formal party, Okaasan," Himeko suggested.

"Yes, but what we call casual and they do can't be the same!"

"You may be right," Himeko agreed, then suddenly giggled at the thought of Chikane's father wrestling with a barbecue grill. No, Himemiya "casual" definitely wasn't the same as Kurusugawa "causal"!

"I can't think that encouraging the acquaintance is a good idea, and yet the Himemiyas seem to be interested in pursuing it." She paused to shake her head. "I just do not understand what they can be thinking."

_They want to build a relationship with their future in-laws,_ Himeko thought, but was bright enough not to say it out loud. The idea of Himeko and Chikane's relationship being a permanent one, to say nothing of Chikane's family openly treating it that way, would just spark an argument. The mental image of Chikane in a bridal gown, though, put a happy smile on her face all the way through dinner.


	2. Chapter 2

"So the real problem turned out to be the girl's aunt. She didn't believe Kozuki wanted to reform and kept the pressure on to drive him away, and that eventually led to a showdown between the biker gang and the _yakuza_."

"This story doesn't sound like it has a happy ending," Chikane told Alice. The two girls, dressed in identical white T-shirts and red shorts, Chikane's hair pulled back in a topknot so it didn't go swirling around her, were out for their early morning run, a tradition the friends had started together in junior high. The Lunar Priestess, in fact, worked out regularly both for aerobic exercise and with weights, so that her current body would be capable of the athletic and more importantly combat skills that her soul already knew from lifetimes of practice. Alice had joined her, both for the benefits of the exercise and because it gave the girls a chance to hang out together.

"It didn't. Emiko was visiting Kozuki, pleading with him to quit the gang, when the _yakuza_ attacked and she got shot in the crossfire. Next week's the last episode, so we'll get to see if she makes it and what happens to them."

"I hope they do. I get tired of love stories that have tragic endings."

"That's why I'm always borrowing Mom's collection of English-language romance novels. Happily-ever-after every time. I mean, when a good chunk of society thinks your romance is a perversion of the natural order, you a want a few happy examples."

"That's true," Chikane agreed. "It took me far too long to realize that I wasn't some kind of freak for being gay."

"You're darned lucky, you know."

"I know." Chikane smiled, thinking of Himeko, then belatedly realized that that probably wasn't what Alice was talking about. "Actually, what did you mean?"

"Thinking of Himeko, eh?" Alice said slyly. "You got this dreamy little smile for just a second there."

Chikane blushed, something she didn't really do all that often.

"Anyway, what I meant was, your parents are behind you on this. They accept you for who you are and for how you and Himeko feel about each other. That means if anybody wants to get snippy, they're running full up against the weight of the Himemiya family. I mean, you guys founded this whole town umpteen generations back, you founded the school, and your assorted companies are the biggest employers in the whole prefecture. Your average bigot isn't going to want to fly into the teeth of that storm, so you don't have to worry about teachers going off on you about 'inappropriate relationships' or restaurants refusing to seat you or love hotels not giving you a room...not that you'd ever need to stay at a love hotel given that palace you call a home—"

"Do we _have_ to bring the technical aspects of my love life into this?"

"Yes, yes we do," Alice decided. "Especially since Saya and I haven't gotten past second base yet. Besides which, it's just a matter of time before somebody works up the guts to ask Himeko what the great Miya-sama is like in bed."

Chikane glanced at her sharply.

"You're not serious."

"Oh, yes I am. I overheard some of the boys talking about it just yesterday afternoon."

She groaned.

"Don't people have _anything_ better to do with their lives?"

Alice considered the question with mock seriousness.

"Not really, no. Kidding aside, though, Miya, you're the school idol, and since you've been waiting for Himeko all these years, you've become this unreachable ideal for a lot of people. Now, though, you've finally picked someone and, well...people are curious. But you see, this is exactly what I was talking about. If Himeko was dating, say, me, then she'd probably be getting bullied all over the place. Sure, she still gets occasional grief from your fan club, but most of the kids are either respectful of the princess's consort or jealous as hell. What _nobody's_ calling her, at least not where anybody can hear, is 'that filthy dyke' or anything like that. Why? Because she's dating _you_."

"If I can protect her in any way, then I will," Chikane said. "There's a reason why I've been working on my parents since I was a toddler, letting them know that Himeko was coming. A foreordained meeting carries much more weight than a schoolgirl crush." That wasn't to say that their support for Chikane wasn't because of their love for her and desire for her to be happy, because that was at the core of it. Saya's parents, Chikane was sure, wouldn't have given a damn about past lives or destined lovers in the Himemiyas' place. But without the groundwork Chikane had laid, her parents wouldn't be inviting the Kurusugawas over for family dinners, either, not anywhere near to this soon.

"Like I said, lucky. And speaking of your one-and-only, there she is."

The girls had just rounded a corner in their run, and could see Himeko up ahead in front of her house, dressed the same way they were and her hair in braids. She waved happily at the sight of them, her face lighting up. A sleek black Mercedes pulled up alongside her, and she handed over her school bag and folded uniform to the driver, who placed them into the back seat. Chikane and Alice reached her a minute later and the girlfriends shared a hug and a quick peck on the lips.

_I'd rather have a real kiss_, Chikane thought, but she'd promised her family that she'd conduct herself with the same discretion and decorum as if she was dating a boy, and French kissing on the sidewalk just didn't meet that standard. Being around Himeko reminded her so firmly of how the face of "Miya-sama" she projected to the world was just a veneer, her poise a carefully constructed artifice over emotions that burned furiously. Her ladylike calm was no more than skin deep, as she'd just proven yesterday when she'd lost control and threatened Otoha.

_For most things it's not that I have control, it's just that I don't care enough about them to be emotional._

Indeed, in past lives, if it hadn't been centered around Himeko, _nothing_ had mattered, like the whole world was cast in black and white and only Himeko and things related to her held light, color, or _reality_. It had actually been kind of disconcerting for her growing up in _this_ life when she found that light, that color in other things, other _people, _like her parents and grandparents, Alice, and Arrow. It...was like the sunlight of Himeko's love had fallen on the withered garden of her soul and was coaxing it back into new life.

"Is something wrong, Chikane-chan? Did you hurt yourself?" Himeko noticed her sudden wince. Chikane found herself blushing.

"No, I just had a really, awfully sappy thought."

"Oh? How sappy?"

"_You'd_ be embarrassed if you thought of it," she said, tapping Himeko on the nose with her fingertip.

"Miya, you need to say things like that out loud so we can all laugh at you!" Alice complained.

"I'm sorry; I'll try to remember to open myself up to public mockery next time."

"Good. Just because you're officially out now doesn't get you out of the obligation to provide straight lines!"

~X X X~

Himeko checked her reflection in the mirror one last time to make sure her bow was straight and her uniform properly in place. They'd run in to school as Alice and Chikane had been doing for several years now, arriving in time to shower and change in the locker room. Her legs ached and she was a little out of breath, but then that was the point—she'd always been a lousy athlete, with poor grades in gym class and no interest in sports. Now that she was on the kendo team, though, she wanted to get in shape so her lack of fitness didn't let her down.

_It's kind of exciting_, she thought, _that people are counting on me to help win tournaments!_ She'd had people rely on the Solar Priestess, of course, but this was the first time in ordinary life she could remember being the one that others relied on. _It's actually pretty neat!_

She hoped that she'd be able to join the others earlier in the run soon. Since she didn't have their conditioning, Chikane and Alice got part of their exercise done first and picked Himeko up halfway through.

"Who designed this uniform, anyway?" Alice complained. "All these buttons, and ties, and these ridiculous leg-o-mutton sleeves that went out of fashion back when Queen Victoria died. We don't all have maids to help us dress."

"Why don't you help her, Chikane-chan?" Himeko suggested. "I have to meet with Kisaragi-san about our project before homeroom, anyway."

"Are you sure you'll be all right? I can't imagine what Saya-san was thinking."

"She didn't know, Miya, and when Himeko came in it would have just embarrassed everybody to start changing things around, including Himeko herself," Alice defended her girlfriend. "Besides, Kisaragi has to play nice or she screws up the story and risks getting bounced from her club. That'd be a lot more trouble than she could deal with—particularly as she fangirls almost as hard over Saya as she does for you."

"Arisu-chan is right, Chikane-chan." She reached out and cupped the dark-haired girl's cheek in her palm, feeling the warmth of her skin. "Thanks for caring so much, though. I love you."

"I love you too, Himeko."

More than one head turned to look as she passed people on her way to Otoha's homeroom. Miya-sama's girlfriend was still an item of interest even though it had been a couple of weeks since the revelation. The new transfer student who came in and charmed the school idol was someone to whet people's curiosity. The looks she got varied from impressed to jealous to distaste, but one thing was for certain: very few people didn't have _some_ opinion. _I feel like a shoujo manga cliché!_ she thought wryly.

Himeko managed to find the room after only two wrong turns and was let in by a handsome boy who stared at her searchingly.

"Um, do I have something on my face?"

"Oh! S-sorry, it's just...well, you don't look like the kind of girl who could be so much better than Oneesan."

"Oneesan?" She gave him a second look. His angular features _did_ look vaguely familiar, now that she thought of it. Himeko tried imagining his face on a girl, noticing that it existed in that nebulous space where as a boy it seemed delicate, even pretty, while as a girl the sharp angles of cheekbones and chin would be foxlike, perhaps even harsh. "Oh! Oomori-sempai! Is Oomori-sempai your older sister?"

The boy smiled.

"That's right. I'm Oomori Takuma. Naomi-oneesan says that you're the best natural talent that she's ever seen, maybe even better than Miya-sama."

Himeko blushed fiercely at the unsolicited compliment and at the slightly inaccurate praise. While her ability with the sword might seem like natural talent, she knew that it was actually the result of hard work and practice, literal lifetimes of being reborn as a shrine maiden of the God of Swords who fought the demonic Orochi. It almost felt unfair to be applying those abilities in a high-school kendo match, although since she hadn't awakened as a priestess there was nothing supernatural about her strength, stamina, or agility (quite the opposite, actually).

"I'm not anything special," she murmured. "If Oomori-sempai weren't so patient in teaching me the rules of kendo I'd be useless to the team," she added politely.

"Maybe, but according to Oneesan, that's because you fight with the skills and instincts of someone in a _real_ fight. She told me about the sparring match Miya-sama had with you when she introduced you to the team—wow!" He shook his head. "I'm sorry for babbling. You must have come here for something and I'm wasting your time. What did you need?"

"I was supposed to meet Kisaragi-san?"

"Oh, sure. The Gang of Three is in a back corner there." He stepped aside and gestured towards the window side of the room on the side away from the chalkboard.

"Thank you. It was nice to meet you, Oomori-kun."

"You, too. Good luck in the upcoming tournament, Kurusugawa-san."

Otoha and her friends were clustered right where Oomori had said they'd be, glaring at her with emotions that ranged from sour discontent through contempt to anger.

"I can't believe the Newspaper Club is making you do this," Kyoko snapped indignantly, obviously saying it for Himeko's benefit. "Making you work with that little tramp is nothing more than an insult."

"I didn't realize that Miya-sama could be so petty. Everyone knows that Nanase-sama is one of her clique. She probably ordered Nanase-sama to do this to humiliate you," Misaki added.

"That isn't true!" Himeko and Otoha protested at the same time, then looked at each other in surprise.

"Saya-san didn't know that I was the one the Photography Club had sent to help. She wouldn't have assigned us to work together otherwise; she wouldn't do that to one of her club members."

"Nanase-sama isn't a petty person who'd put up with that kind of stunt! She doesn't have that kind of childish cruelty in her, and she cares too much about the paper to use it to settle a score."

"And Chikane-chan fights her own battles. She doesn't have to hide behind a group of friends to do it for her."

Misaki and Kyoko hadn't been expecting this sudden, double-barreled assault and recoiled, confused. Otoha stood up.

"Kurusugawa-san and I need to talk about how we're going to do this story." She turned to Himeko and said, "Let's go. It's too noisy in here to think." Leaving her friends behind to wonder if she'd meant it literally or as a slap at them, she got up and marched towards the door, leaving Himeko to trail along in her wake. They left the room and went down the hall to where the end of the hall past the entrance to the stairs formed a little nook with a window at the end. Otoha spun around so fast Himeko nearly crashed into her.

"Eep!"

"Look, Kurusugawa-san, it's not a secret that I think you're a nasty little slut who got her hooks into Miya-sama somehow. That isn't going to change. But the paper means a lot to me, and I'm not going to let Nanase-sama and the club down by screwing up this article. So we have to work together to do a good job." She paused, then added in a bitter tone, "'Saya-san,' huh? You do move fast."

"She said that since I was on a first-name basis with Chikane-chan's other close friends...Though Arisu-chan and Arrow-chan are informal people, so I said it would be all right if I addressed her properly, but she insisted that it would make her uncomfortable if I didn't think of her in the same way as the others. So I was going to call her 'Saya-chan,' but that didn't seem right for her. I mean, she's so beautiful and elegant like Chikane-chan, but not..." She broke off, not quite able to finish the sentence. _My girlfriend_ wasn't anywhere near to being adequate, while things like _my lover_ or _my everything_ weren't everything she felt comfortable saying to the corkscrew-curled blonde.

Otoha boggled at her, her face a mix of confusion and distaste.

"You're being serious, aren't you?"

"Um...yes?"

"My God, do you babble like this all the time? How does Miya-sama _stand_ it?"

_I think she thinks it's cute,_ Himeko thought, but didn't say.

"Okay, whatever," Otoha apparently wasn't interested in pressing the point. "Let's just stick to the story. We'll ask around and make a list of the mysteries of the school that we find and who we hear them from. Then we can look into the stories and see if there's any truth to them. Then I'll write the article and you can take pictures of the various places. I think Nanase-sama wants the article to play out like an impromptu tour of the school."

"So you'll want the pictures to offer a kind of unusual view? Like, if a person stands in one particular spot and looks, they'll get a completely different perspective on a familiar place?"

"Yeah, something like that," Otoha agreed, then did a double-take. "Hey, you _are_ taking this seriously."

Himeko pouted.

"Of course I am! This is a club assignment for me, too!"

"Yeah, I guess. I just...oh, never mind. And if we come up with any really spooky stories, then you'll have to try and maybe work in a little mystery into the pictures, you know, shadows and haunted-house stuff."

"Mmn! I'll be using black-and-white film since it's for newspaper photography, anyway, so there are lots of effects I can play with."

"Wait...film? You mean like, real film? Not a digital camera?"

"Uh-huh. My own camera is digital, of course, but the club has some really nice equipment. It's a little trickier, but you can get a lot better pictures that way."

She paused suddenly, thinking. The club president had mentioned when Himeko had been oohing and ahhing over their equipment that they'd had some anonymous donations a couple of years ago which had enabled them to upgrade. Did those donations happen to have the name Himemiya on the bottom of the checks? Because Chikane knew that the girlfriend she hadn't met yet was a photography buff and wanted the opportunity to be waiting?

It was, after all, the kind of thing Chikane would do. She liked being sneaky, and she had fun doing nice things for Himeko without telling her, so she could see the happy look on Himeko's face without having to fend off thanks (or Himeko's protests that she didn't deserve it). Chikane herself probably didn't even realize it, but Himeko had noticed that she actually _liked_ playing Lady Bountiful and making people happy, even back when she'd been so caught in despair to be a Neck of Orochi. The things she did publicly, of course, were more calculated artifice than goodwill, but Himeko was sure there was more to her private instincts.

_I'll find out if it's true, and if so I'll surprise her with a thank-you gift!_ Himeko decided.

"Hey, what's with all the grinning? Is there something funny about pictures?"

"Oh! I'm sorry, Kisaragi-san; I was just thinking about something Chikane-chan did. I didn't mean to space out on you."

Otoha sighed.

"Just try not to do that when we're trying to accomplish something, okay?"

"Sorry..."

A thought struck Himeko.

"Hey, do you know of any of the mysteries yourself, Kisaragi-san? You've been a student here a lot longer than I have."

"As a matter of fact, I have, and it's about your classroom."

She grinned evilly, and Himeko knew the other girl was about to try and scare her...and probably succeed, Himeko reflected ruefully.

"It's called the Demon of the Ungrateful," Otoha went on. "They say that once, many years ago, a girl had brought a birthday present for her best friend to class, but at the end of the day, she forgot it. Only after class was over, she remembered, and she went back to the room to get the gift. Everybody was gone, not even the teachers were still there in the school, but she crept in anyway. With a sigh of relief, she found the present still there where she left it, only to find herself staring into the eyes of a giant devil, which seized her in its grasp and carried her away right through the wall of the classroom. They say that even today, the room is haunted by the spirit of the girl, who can only find peace if it can find another person who forgets a gift to feed to the demon in her place!"

Himeko's reaction was not, she suspected, what Otoha had been hoping for.


	3. Chapter 3

"Geez, Chikane-chan, it wasn't _that_ funny!" Himeko moaned. Himemiya Chikane, it seemed, begged to differ; she had her arms wrapped round her midsection, laughing so hard that she sagged against the oak tree and would have fallen over if not for its support.

"I don't get it," Arrow said. The five friends were eating lunch together in the rose garden. "I mean, sure, the story's obviously bull, but it's not particularly funny."

"Though Miya's sense of humor is a little out of whack," Alice noted.

"That is true," agreed Saya. She sat next to Alice, hands clasped, taking advantage of the privacy of the garden spot to be close with her girlfriend.

"It's a deep act of friendship that I'm not getting video of this on my cell and uploading it to the Internet," Alice continued. "I don't think the world is ready for their Miya-sama laughing until she's red-faced and crying."

"But what the heck is so funny, anyway?"

"Some day, Chikane-chan, _you're_ going to be an urban legend and we'll all sit around laughing at _you_," Himeko huffed, which just set Chikane off into renewed laughter.

"She already is," Alice contributed. "There's one story called 'The Haunted Rose Garden,' where mysterious voices, always female, can be heard coming from the rose garden even though it's off-limits to students except at special viewing times. Except that one is us, thanks to Miya's secret gap in the hedge. No, wait, didn't you actually find the gap, Himeko? Miya said something about that once, I think."

"Mmn," Himeko agreed, nodding. She swallowed her mouthful of sweet omelet and explained, "Chikane-chan would just use the gate, since as student council president she had the key. I chased a loose puppy into the hedge and found the gap by accident."

"So anyway, kids walking by the main garden outside here could sometimes catch bits of our conversation, so it became a legend that the garden was haunted."

"Oh! But we can't say that in the story, can we, Saya-san? If it would get you into trouble..."

Saya shook her head.

"It's all right, Kurusugawa-san. Himemiya-san is the council president, so as you suggested she has a right to be here."

"Not to mention the Himemiyas pretty much pay for the garden anyway, as part of their endowment of the academy," Arrow added. "So I don't think anyone'd raise a stink about Himemiya using the place to get a few minutes' peace from her fans now and again."

"We won't publish that, though, for Himemiya-san's privacy," Saya decided, "but it's all right to tell Kisaragi-san if she stats looking for an explanation."

Himeko nodded.

"Thank you."

"Though if that snotty fangirl tries to poke her nose in here, I'm kicking her back out and I won't be nice enough to send her through the gap!"

"Down, Arrow," Alice snickered.

Chikane's laughter was winding down; she took several deep breaths to try to catch up on oxygen.

"I'm still not sure that I understand what was so funny. Kurusugawa-san, what did you mean about if Himemiya-san became an urban legend and that we'd laugh at her? Are you saying that she is laughing at you?"

Himeko sighed heavily, letting her breath out in a woosh.

"...Yes," she admitted. She turned and glared at her lover. "Shouldn't you have gotten all your laughing done in the sixteen years before I moved here?"

Chikane held up her hands.

"I didn't know, Himeko, honestly. I'd never heard that story before today."

"I hadn't heard it either," Arrow admitted. "Though, to be fair, I usually glaze over at stories about ghosts and demons."

"I've heard it," Alice said.

"And I only heard it because you told me," Saya added. "Where did you hear it from?"

"Ah, Aniki was giving me grief about how I was in the haunted classroom this year and how I'd better not forget my books and all that."

"You have an older brother, Arisu-chan?" Himeko asked.

Alice held up three fingers.

"Three of 'em. Fred's twenty-seven; he was at university when we moved to Japan so he stayed in Canada. Scott is twenty-two, and Alex is twenty. Oh, Scott is 'Oniisan' and Alex is 'Aniki,' in case you were wondering, though most of the time I just use their names."

"Wow. Do you have any siblings, Saya-san, Arrow-chan?"

"I'm an only child," Saya observed quietly, apparently wishing she had siblings.

"I've got a big sister," Arrow contributed. "I don't see her much, though; she was a real rebel in high school and got into a lot of fights with our parents, until she finally ran off to Tokyo." She shrugged. "We still talk now and again, though we don't ask too many questions about what she's doing."

"Eh?"

"Yakuza," Chikane said succinctly.

"She seems happy, though. It's not exactly a respectable lifestyle, but..."

"Preacher's daughter," Alice said. "East or West, some things are pretty constant."

"So you still get along, then?" Himeko asked Arrow.

"Oh, yeah. It's not that she and my parents hated each other or anything, just that Tsu-nee wanted to be badass and Otousan thought she was being bad and an ass."

"And speaking of bad jokes, you still haven't explained why you were laughing like a maniac, Miya."

Chikane sipped her tea placidly.

"It's because she knows what started the story," Himeko sighed.

"So how do _you_ know that?" Alice pressed. "You haven't even been here a month."

Himeko blushed, and Chikane had to bite her lip to keep from bursting out laughing all over again.

"It's about me," Himeko mumbled.

"Did you say it was..._about_ you?"

"But you just moved here, Kurusugawa-san."

"No, I mean..." Belatedly, Himeko realized how awkward these kind of explanations could sound. Chikane chose to speak up then and spare her the burden of putting it into words.

"Do all of you remember how it was that I said I knew I'd meet up with Himeko again?"

"Yeah; I swear, you could have knocked me over with a feather when I saw Himeko walk into our classroom for the first time and you two go all googly-eyed over each other. Oh! Oh, I get it now!" Alice clapped her hands. "You always said you knew her from your past lives together. So this is from an incident in that past life?"

"Exactly," Chikane said. "Though obviously very different than the way it really happened."

"Oh, I don't know. After all, the girl from the story _is_ still haunting the classroom."

"Arisu-chan!"

"Kidnapped by demons," Arrow groaned. "Yeah, I can bet the story changed."

"Wait, so you _don't_ believe in demons, but you _do_ believe Miya and Himeko had a past life together?" Alice boggled. "Isn't that kind of an odd place to be drawing a line?"

"Okay..._were_ you spirited away by a demon, Himeko-chan?"

"Well, no..." Himeko shivered, recalling the moment of absolute terror when the hand of Take no Yamikazuchi, the Orochi god, had crashed through the wall of the school and grabbed her, the sudden pain and darkness as she'd been knocked unconscious. She'd have died there, had Ohgami Souma not shaken off the Orochi curse when he saw that the priestess he'd been trying to kill was the girl he cared for.

No, she hadn't been _spirited away_ by a demon. But that didn't mean that the demon hadn't been there.

_Then again_...A playful little smile crept over her lips.

"You look like the cat that swallowed the canary," Alice said. "What are you grinning about?"

"I was just remembering. The end of that incident was the first time that Chikane-chan kissed me."

"Your first kiss?" Arrow said. "You've got to tell us about it!"

"Oh, definitely."

"I'd like to hear, too..."

"Well...I was lying there, nearly unconscious—"

"Unconscious!" Alice yelped.

"The wall collapsed," Himeko explained, "and I fell." It wasn't the full and complete truth, but it was accurate so far as it went without bringing in the priestesses or Orochi. "Chikane-chan had rushed to my side at once and as I came around, I found myself cradled in her arms. She whispered 'Happy birthday'—we'd just turned sixteen that day—and the next thing I knew she was kissing me!"

"So Miya was so worried that you'd been hurt, then relieved that you were okay, that she couldn't hold back her feelings any longer? That _is_ amazing. I never believed she'd be the one to confess first!"

"Not that Himeko noticed," Chikane said with a wry grin.

"Wait, what do you mean, she didn't notice? She's telling us the story, isn't she?" Arrow demanded.

Himeko blushed.

"I was just waking up from being knocked out, so I was still a little loopy. And Chikane-chan, well, she was _Miya-sama_, just like she is now, beautiful, talented, this incredible person! She was everybody's idol, and she was just kissing me out of the blue? I didn't believe it was possible that she could do something like that, so I thought it was just a dream. And I couldn't just come out and ask her, 'Hey, did you kiss me yesterday, or was I just dreaming from hitting my head too hard?' I mean, if it _was_ a dream, how creepy would _that_ be, huh?"

Alice pursed her lips in a look of mock concentration, then pretended to reach a conclusion: "So basically what you're telling us is, that you've always been an airhead?"

"Aw, geez," Himeko groaned, while everyone laughed, but even she had a grin on her face.

"Though to be fair, look at her side of it," Alice went on. "It can't be easy to look at the girl you like and say, 'Excuse me, Chikane-chan, but are you a creepy lesbian stalker who kissed me while I was half unconscious, or am I a creepy lesbian stalker who fantasizes about things like that and can't tell my dreams from reality?' Tough choice, really."

"Um...actually we're both kinda creepy and stalker-ish?" Himeko returned the joke and got everyone to laugh.

"You can dream about me kissing you whenever you like, Himeko." She'd meant to be teasing, but put a little too much truth into the words and Himeko found herself staring into liquid sapphire-blue eyes that were overflowing with naked emotion, the raw force of Chikane's love for her. She wanted to respond, but her breath caught in her throat and she felt tears start to well up...

"Oi! Hey, lovebirds, some of us haven't finished eating yet, here," Arrow spoke up, and took a bite of her melon bread to illustrate her point. The lovers broke off the shared gaze, blushing.

"It's fun having Himeko around," Alice observed to no one in particular. "It was really hard to find stuff to tease Miya about until now."

~X X X~

Oomori Naomi pulled off her kendo mask.

"That was really nice work, Kurusugawa-san."

"Really?" her opponent asked, a trace of disbelief in her voice.

"Yeah, really," Oomori told her.

Himeko took off her mask as well, revealing blonde hair matted to her face by sweat.

"I'm glad. The _shinai_"—the bamboo sword used in kendo—"still doesn't feel quite natural."

"The scary thing is, I believe you." She'd seen Himeko using a _bokken—_the solid wooden practice blade designed to imitate the weight and curve of an actual sword—and it was amazing, like something out of a video game.

Sometimes, Oomori wished she had gone to some other school. It had been bad enough last year, when she'd been expected to be team captain until prodigy Himemiya Chikane had walked in and shown that she was as ridiculously good at kendo as she was at everything else she did. Well, it had been aggravating to be shown up by a first-year, but it was mostly all right because at least Himemiya backed up that princess attitude with ability. And she was a good captain, too, patient with the team members, stern when she had to be but generally supportive, even if sometimes Oomori got the idea that it didn't really go down deep...as if she was an actress playing the role of "good team captain" off a script. Himemiya's friend Alice Ishida was also on the team and once in a while Oomori caught something in how Himemiya dealt with Ishida that was missing with other people. It wasn't just the casualness of friendship but a...lack of polish that called attention to the "performance" aspect of how Himemiya dealt with other people.

It was kind of funny. A lot of people, even a couple of the team members, were upset with Himemiya for outing herself and having a girlfriend. Oomori actually found it made her like the team captain more for putting some really big cracks of humanity in the too-perfect facade.

That did _not_ mean that Oomori appreciated having the girlfriend foisted off on them as a member of the kendo team. Until, of course, the shy, clumsy, puppy-like girl had proven to be as ridiculous a talent as the captain. Himemiya you'd at least expect it from. Kurusugawa did not exactly project the warrior spirit. Instead of striking out with a bold battle cry, she was more likely to whimper when she parried a blow. Which she did a lot, since Oomori had never landed even one hit on her in practice.

Honestly, Kurusugawa's problem with kendo was that she was _too_ good, that she did by reflex things that weren't proper for a kendo match but perfectly useful for killing someone with a four-foot piece of sharpened metal. Oomori, as deputy captain, was working with her not so much to develop her skill but to help compartmentalize her mind, to create that divide between "kendo" and "battle" that Himemiya already possessed.

It was rewarding work, because Kurusugawa was clearly trying hard to accomplish this (and like any teacher will say, a student who _wanted_ to learn was a pleasure to teach), but also because the part of Oomori's soul that resented being _deputy_ captain to a younger girl liked seeing that there was someone actually capable of scoring points off Himemiya.

"Honestly, the only thing you're really having trouble with is your _kiai_," she told her pupil. "It needs to be simultaneous with the strike and you're still throwing it in as an afterthought at least half the time. The referee won't award a point just for hitting your opponent, and you don't want to end up in a zero-zero match. Especially if you run into judges who don't like the idea that Ototachibana's best swordswomen are dating each other."

"I'll try harder," Kurusugawa promised. "I'm...just not really very good at yelling."

_Gee, who'd have thunk?_

"A battle cry isn't about being angry at your opponent. It's an expression of your warrior spirit, coming from within you rather than any outside stimulation."

Kurusugawa looked at her blankly.

"Um, I'm not really sure I understand, Oomori-sempai."

Oomori sighed, thinking it over.

"Well, try it this way. You fight like you've trained for real combat. Have you ever been in a serious, real-life fight?"

"Mmn."

_Which I haven't, and yet which I'm now going to lecture you about_, Oomori considered the ironies of teaching.

"Then, try imagining that you're in a fight like that, and that you're protecting something very important to you, like Himemiya-_buchou_. So it doesn't matter if you're facing an opponent you can beat easily or a really tough enemy that takes everything you have. You're going to give it everything that you can because you can't afford to lose. So you reach down deep, summon all your courage and determination, and you _strike—_and you cry out with all that spirit, because it's too much to be contained. You exhale while you strike, and the _kiai_ bursts out of you, almost as part of the blow, not just something else added on. Does that make sense to you?"

Kurusugawa frowned.

"I...I think so. I'm not sure that I can really do it, though."

"We'll try it on a few practice strokes, then, without sparring. Like I said, the opponent's irrelevant."

"Okay. We haven't been doing much of that."

"That's because I don't have anything to teach you about your form. There's no point in me observing you practice that when you're better than I am, so you can do that on your own when I'm working with the other members. This is different."

"Yes, Oomori-sempai. Oh! That reminds me, I met your younger brother today."

"Oh, so Takuma finally got to talk to you? I hope he didn't fanboy all over your shoes."

Kurusugawa giggled.

"Well, maybe just a little."

"Kid brothers. Can't live with 'em, can't drown 'em at birth. Do you have any siblings?"

"Yes; I have a younger brother, too, although he's only ten."

Oomori grinned at her.

"Well, then, you know what I'm talking about!"

"But he can be really fun, too."

"Yeah, mine too. Family, right?"

"Uh-huh."

Himeko blinked, her violet eyes going unfocused for a second as if she was trying to think of something.

"Oomori-sempai, have you ever heard of the 'Seven Mysteries of Ototachibana Academy'?"

"Yeah, I think so. I've heard some stories, at least."

"Oh! Could you tell me about them?" she asked happily.

"Kurusugawa-san, aren't you supposed to be practicing your _kiai_? Why are you so interested?"

"The Photography Club has me working with Kisaragi-san of the Newspaper Club on a story about them."

"I'm glad you're so enthusiastic, but may I point out that this is the _Kendo_ Club, and that we have a tournament next week in which we're expecting you to help us win."

The strawberry blonde sighed.

"Yes, Oomori-sempai."

"Good. Now remember what I told you?"

"Mmn," Kurusugawa affirmed, nodding.

"Then let's give it a try."

Kurusugawa assumed the ready position and began to attempt a sequence of forms, _kata_. Oomori noticed at once that she seemed stiffer, her movements less fluid than they had during sparring. It was all part of the puzzle that made up the blonde girl; she was so badly out of shape—strength, muscular endurance, and cardiovascular endurance alike—that Oomori was convinced she'd never had any kind of rigorous exercise in her life. That made her different from Himemiya, who was in top condition. But it also made no sense, since the kind of training it would take to be _that_ good would certainly take time and effort. Yet Kurusugawa was as soft as a baby, despite her absurd skill level.

A mystery.

It almost made Oomori think of magic. That would almost make more sense than the known facts.

As deputy captain, she made a few suggestions. It got easier for Kurusugawa when she tried to imagine an opponent in front of her. Clearly, whatever was lurking in her subconscious was prepared for combat, not training exercises. She was clearly doing her best as a team member, though, trying to integrate those battle instincts with the rules of kendo. She was getting better at it, too, when Oomori called a halt to the practice.

"Nice," she said. "I think you're starting to get it, Kurusugawa-san."

Her face lit up with childlike glee.

"Really? I am?"

"Yeah, and faster than I expected, too." It struck her that a samurai's _kiai_ was a traditional part of swordsmanship that had been adapted to the sport of kendo, so maybe that instinct of Kurusugawa's _wanted_ to use it and it was the girl's personality getting in the way? It would explain her rapid absorption of the concept as well as anything, Oomori supposed.

"Thank you, Oomori-sempai!" She mopped her sweating face and neck with a towel.

"So, since you've been a good sport about it, I thought I'd tell you about one of those Seven Mysteries. I've only heard the one story, though. Ghosts and magic don't really interest me much."

"Any at all would be great. Kisaragi-san and I are trying to compile all of them. She told me about one this morning, and Arisu-chan another at lunch."

"So it's five to two that this won't be a repeat. Good odds. It's called the 'Goblin of the Old Hall,' or sometimes the 'Hungry Goblin.' Did you hear about that one?"

Kurusugawa shook her head.

"No, not at all."

"Good! Now, the Old Hall is actually part of the original academy building. As you know, the academy is laid out like a large T, with the 'stem' being the new wing that was built around forty years ago. The central section and the east wing had a lot of extensive repair work around twenty years ago; they followed the original plans as best they could but some things had to be altered on account of the new construction."

"So that's why I keep getting lost!"

"Huh?"

"Oh, nothing. I'm sorry for interrupting you, sempai," she said, looking embarrassed.

"Well, in any case, the west wing is still pretty much intact. They say that the upper level, where the science labs, home ec, and music rooms are located, is haunted by a mountain goblin that inhabited this hill. The story goes that the west wing was built right over the entrance to its lair when the school was first constructed, and that it creeps up into the building. Sometimes, when classes are over, if people have to go to those rooms for club activities or the like, they can hear rustling in the halls or the scrape of footsteps from above...and if you leave out food, the goblin will eat it during the night."

"Really?" Kurusugawa squeaked.

Oomori nodded.

"Uh-huh. Some people do it as an offering, either to bring good luck on a test or to turn away the goblin's wrath at having its mountain used as a building site."

Kurusugawa shuddered.

"H-have you ever heard the goblin, Oomori-sempai?"

Oomori shook her head.

"No, not heard it—but last year, when I heard the story, it was because I saw one of my sempai setting out meat for the goblin so I asked her why. She told me about the goblin and, sure enough, next morning nothing was left of the food but bits and crumbs!"

"S-so, c-could it have been a prank?"

Oomori shrugged.

"I don't know, but if it is, a lot of people are helping out with it because it still happens pretty often even now."

"Oh, my!"

"Kurusugawa-san, are you scared of ghosts?"

She shook her head.

"No, I'm not scared of ghosts...it's just, I _am_ scared by ghost _stories_!"

That was an odd distinction to make, Oomori thought, but shrugged it off.

"Anyway, you've had enough of a break. Get your mask and we'll try sparring again and see if you can do better with those _kiai_ now."

"Yes, sempai!"


	4. Chapter 4

"Excuse me, Kisaragi-san?"

Otoha had just been getting her shoes out of her locker when she heard the soft, cultured voice. She snapped bolt upright in her surprise.

"Nanase-sama!" _Gah! Did I just squeak? I sound like a complete idiot!_ "Is there anything I can do for you?"

"No, it's...actually, I wanted to apologize to you."

That idea immediately returned a "does not compute" in Otoha's brain on reflex alone.

"Nanase-sama, that isn't possible; you can't have anything to apologize to me about."

Saya smiled at her wanly, a bit of self-deprecating humor in her expression.

"Not even for assigning you to work on the 'Seven Mysteries' story with Kurusugawa-san?"

"I...well...that is..." The polite lie stuck in Otoha's throat, choked off by the sudden flare of resentment.

The ladylike editor sighed.

"I thought so. Look, Kisaragi-san, I do want to apologize. I would never have given you the job if I'd known the Photography Club had sent Kurusugawa-san to work with us."

"I know that, Nanase-_buchou_. You wouldn't play a trick like that. Kurusugawa-san told me the same thing this morning, but like I said to her I knew it already that it had been accidental. You just aren't the kind of person who'd be mean like that, not even to play a joke!" she responded earnestly.

"I'm glad you think so. Even so, it was my job as editor and club president to know in advance who was going to be involved with producing our paper, and my failure to do that ended up causing trouble for you, a club member. For that, I am very sorry."

"P-please, Nanase-_buchou_, this isn't necessary."

"If you like, I can switch your assignment with someone else's, so you would be more comfortable."

Otoha drew herself up.

"Nanase-_buchou_, I have my pride as a Newspaper Club member to consider as well. You expect me to be able to work on difficult stories at any time, to investigate and find the truth even if information is hard to come by. How could you count on me to dig out a real scoop if I gave up on a story just because I had a personality conflict with a co-worker?"

Saya smiled.

"I'm glad to hear that, Kisaragi-san. I'll expect your draft article, then, by the set deadline."

"Yes, Nanase-_buchou_!"

Saya turned away and began to walk off, the stopped after a couple of steps and turned back.

"Kisaragi-san, I'd like to ask you something else, not as the club president, but just as Nanase Saya." She paused a heartbeat, then continued. "Could you please try to get along better with Kurusugawa-san? I understand that you have always admired Himemiya-san—we all have, haven't we?—and that Kurusugawa-san isn't necessarily the person with whom we would expect her to fall in love. But they do love each other very much, seriously, not just as a crush."

"Nanase-sama, I—"

"Please, Kisaragi-san. I'm not saying that you should be close friends, but to try and get along as co-workers and classmates, at least. I am sure you can appreciate how difficult it is for Himemiya-san, with all the expectations placed on her position as heiress of her family, to nevertheless stand up and openly proclaim her sexuality. The amount of courage that must have taken, being aware of how teachers, classmates, her family's business contacts would all start seeing her differently, you can understand, can't you? So, if you really do like and admire Himemiya-san, then even if you don't necessarily like Kurusugawa-san as a person, then could you at least try to get along to respect Himemiya-san's choice?"

"I...I...I'll try, Nanase-sama," Otoha stammered.

"That's good. Thank you, Kisaragi-san. I'll see you tomorrow at the club meeting."

She left, then. Otoha thought, maybe, that she'd managed to mumble some kind of goodbye, but her brain was whirling so fast she was barely aware of where she was.

_What did she mean by that?_ Otoha asked herself. Saya was one of Miya-sama's friends, of course, so it made sense that she would stick up for the girlfriends, but it was the way she'd expressed it that confused the blonde. It almost seemed as if she was implying...

_I am sure you can appreciate how difficult..._

_If you really do like and admire Himemiya-san..._

_The amount of courage...you can understand, can't you?_

Otoha swallowed nervously. _Is Nanase-sama trying to imply that _I'm_...that I like Miya-sama in _that_ way? That I'm _jealous_ of Kurusugawa?_ She wanted to protest, to deny that it was true—but had Saya really said it at all? She'd never actually come right out and made any kind of assertion, had she? Maybe it was Otoha who was reading it all into what Saya had said. Was there a reason her mind kept jumping to that topic?

_Argh! It's not true, it's not! I don't have those kind of dirty feelings for Miya-sama or Nanase-sama! I'm not like Kurusugawa, I'm not!_ But wasn't the other side of that true as well, that Miya-sama had those "dirty feelings" _for_ Kurusugawa? That Miya-sama wanted to...with her...

It was inconceivable! Otoha could no more imagine Miya-sama having those kind of desires than she could imagine herself having them! And yet it was certainly happening. Not just Miya-sama herself but Kurusugawa and Ishida and Ohgami...now Nanase-sama had made a special appeal to get Otoha to understand. And yet she could barely even get her head around the phrase: _Miya-sama is a lesbian_. Four little words, yet she could barely think them, and she knew they'd stick on her tongue if she tried to say them out loud, it was just so impossible.

_I guess...I do understand, a little, about what Nanase-sama meant._ If this was so unthinkable for Otoha to say about someone else, then how hard was it for Miya-sama to invite all those slings and arrows down on herself by proclaiming it? How much courage, indeed.

_And what about Kurusugawa?_ a traitorous thought nagged at her. _She _wasn't the school star. _She_ wasn't beloved by everyone, the student council president, a standout in academics and athletics, from a family with money and prestige to spare. She didn't even have a group of friends to support her, only Miya-sama's. "Hi, I'm a new transfer student, and by the way I'm gay and going to be dating the most popular girl in school"—what kind of introduction was that? If they wanted to talk about courage, wasn't it the mouse with the red bow who was showing the most?

Though of course, _she_ got Miya-sama as her prize for that bravery. And she didn't have anything to lose, while Miya-sama had friends, status, social position, the promising future owed to the Himemiya heiress.

But courage either way.

Otoha let her breath out with a sigh.

_Maybe...Nanase-sama has a point. If I really do respect Miya-sama, then shouldn't I respect her choice? That's what her _friends_ do._

Unless the implication was right, the reason why the idea of the two girls together made her stomach twist and bile rise in her throat really was because she—

_No!_

"That...isn't it..." she murmured softly to the empty room.

~X X X~

"Would you girls like something to drink?" Himeko's mother offered.

"Yes, please," Chikane replied. "An iced tea if you have some, or perhaps a cola?" It was a warm evening, with a hint of the coming summer.

"I'll have a raspberry soda. Thanks, Okaasan."

"All right." Eiko paused at the door. "Wouldn't you be more comfortable at the living room table?"

Actually, that would have been easier for their studying, rather than having Himeko at her desk and Chikane with her books and papers spread out on the floor. Except for one thing.

"Otousan and Shiro are watching TV, though, aren't they?" Himeko said. "It'd be hard for us to study that way, and it wouldn't be fair to make them move for my sake."

"Well...all right, then," the older woman said hesitantly, then left.

"Raspberry," Chikane mused. "That's new."

"Mmn! I started liking it when I was nine. There's a brand that's really sweet; I'm glad it's available here, too."

It made Chikane feel kind of wistful. They'd spent sixteen years apart, after all, so it wasn't surprising that Himeko would have new interests, new likes and dislikes that she'd discovered, but it felt strange to realize that she didn't know everything about her beloved any more.

_I'll just have to come to know you all over again_, she thought. Phrased like that, it sounded fun, like discoveries to find instead of intimacy lost.

That first day they'd been reunited, she'd spent the time between homeroom and lunch suffering the agonies of the damned. Sixteen years apart...she could spend that time making sure her parents and friends knew about Himeko and were expecting Chikane's sudden enthusiasm, but she couldn't control Himeko's feelings. Sixteen years was a long time to wait. What if Himeko had fallen out of love? It had been three and a half hours of torture. Of course those worries had been quickly proven to be ridiculous and insubstantial, but Chikane wondered if that had been part of why she had decided to openly and publicly proclaim their relationship, which had caused trouble for Himeko's family. Luckily, that had been resolved quickly, but if she'd tweaked the timing the problems could have been skipped altogether.

She hadn't told any of this to Himeko, of course, since it would either make her sad ("You don't trust me?"), prompt a scolding, or both. She _had_ told Alice, who'd laughed herself silly, given Chikane a hug, and pointed out that the heiress's problem was that she really didn't trust any situation that she couldn't control. It was a point Chikane could hardly argue, given her track record.

"Chikane-chan, are you sure you wouldn't be more comfortable on the bed? That carpet can't be very soft, especially with you lying down on your stomach like that."

"It's okay. After all, I was the one who wanted to study together at your house, so it's only fair. And I don't really want your mother to be thinking of me in terms of lying on your bed."

"But I like the idea of you lying in my bed," Himeko flirted, making Chikane blush faintly.

"I know," she admitted softly—and it _was_ an admission, as even after all this time there was still part of her mind that couldn't quite work itself around the idea of Himeko as "woman with sexual desires" instead of "pure, pristine angel"—"but we're here to help your family start thinking of me as an ordinary part of your life."

"Oh, is that why you wanted to study here?"

Chikane nodded.

"That's right. I mean, if it was just comfort and efficiency, we could be at my house where we have lots of room, plus a library full of reference materials if we need them. I want to get to know your family, your home, your daily life, and for your family to get to know me, too, so that they can start to accept me as your girlfriend."

"Hm, then maybe you _should_ get on the bed, so Okaasan can get nervous and chase you out of it?"

Chikane giggled.

"You may have a point. If I was a boy, your parents might not let me be alone in your room for fear I'd try to steal second base."

"_Second_ base? You've got the green light to score all the way from first."

She giggled again.

"You make baseball sound so much more interesting, the way you describe it."

She was about to get up and at least get a kiss from Himeko when Kurusugawa Eiko came back with the drinks. _Well, she's got a mother's timing as if I was a boy. I suppose I could consider that a good omen._

They thanked her for the refreshments.

"Are you sure you don't want any snacks?"

"No, thank you, Okaasan. Unless, Chikane-chan, you...?"

Chikane shook her head.

"No, I'm fine too, but thank you for the offer, Kurusugawa-san."

"All right, then, but let me know if you girls need anything at all."

"We will, Okaasan."

She left and the girls returned to their studying. Chikane sipped at her iced tea and was pleasantly surprised to find that it was fresh-brewed rather than bottled. They worked for about ten minutes before Himeko broke the silence.

"Chikane-chan, could you explain something?"

"Are you still having trouble with factoring?"

"Oh, no—well, yes I am, but that isn't what I was asking."

"Oh? What is it, then?"

"Well, it's that mystery of the academy, the one based on when I was attacked by Ohgami-kun's robot?"

"Yes?"

"How did that become a story?"

Chikane rolled over and sat up.

"What do you mean?"

Himeko pursed her lips.

"Well, if I understand it...when we remade the world, it wasn't just restoring what was there, it was a new, different world in which we had never existed. A world without all the malice and pain that had awakened Yamata no Orochi, in which even the Necks had been freed from their despair. Right?"

Chikane nodded.

"That's right—oh!" She thought she understood what Himeko was getting at.

"Well, that means that there was no attack on the school, right? No me to forget your present...no you to give a present to, no Take no Yamikazuchi to knock down the wall..."

"So how did something that _never happened_ become an urban legend, is that it?"

"Yes! It doesn't make sense."

"Hmm..." She frowned, thinking it over. "That's a really good question, Himeko. Let me think about it for a second."

It was a good question, she had to admit.

"But then again," she mused aloud, "when I was Himemiya Chikane for the first time, I remembered killing you, even though when I'd done that the world was remade without you. Yet, I still had that memory. It's different now, because we choose not to be reborn with that world, but back then I would be returned to my life in the world where you 'never existed.' Yet I had that memory, and even though I didn't _consciously_ recall it until awakened as a priestess, I still felt it in the depths of my soul, infecting me with the despair that made me Orochi."

"Chikane-chan..." Himeko murmured tenderly; Chikane held up her hand.

"Sorry, I wasn't whining about it, honestly. I was just using it as a known example."

Himeko's expression went from caring and concerned to simply perplexed. Chikane bit her lip to suppress a laugh at how cute she found it, then went on with her explanation.

"I guess the way I see it is, the human soul is eternal. The world it exists in, lives, experiences, and memories may change, but the soul itself doesn't. So even though they were placed in different lives with different pasts, I think events can linger, particularly ones that were dramatic, shocking, or otherwise emotionally powerful. The other students didn't actually remember Ohgami-kun attacking the school and grabbing you out of the classroom, but the incident lingered like a ghost, a vague story that they felt that they somehow knew, and so it became an urban legend that was passed down in turn through generations of students that didn't have that ghost of a memory and only knew it as a story."

"I see. That makes sense. Sort of."

"Well, it's just a theory," Chikane temporized, "but it seems like it could be the right explanation. It..._feels_ right."

Himeko nodded. "Mmn. I understand it a lot better than algebra, at least!"

Chikane got up.

"Well, then, here, show me where you're having trouble and I'll see what I can help explain. In a way, it's a lot easier than past lives and memories that never were."

"Oh?"

"Yes. In algebra, at least we know that there are correct answers to find. Real life never seems to be that simple, even if you just take one of them at a time."

~X X X~

Traditional Japanese architecture utilized principles of harmony with nature. In practical reality it was no different than Western styles, a method whereby humans mastered their immediate environment to make it suited to their needs, but the appearance—the atmosphere—was completely opposite. The manors and _chateaux_ of Europe dominated the landscape, boldly announcing the presence of their owners, proclaiming their dominion. Their Eastern equivalents flowed into and with the landscape, disguising the fact that their gardens were every bit as ruthlessly mastered as those of the English. One was surrounded by comfort, but also by a soothing style that did not jar.

In contrast to the magnificent European-style mansion of the Himemiyas, the Nanase estate was done in classical Japanese fashion, the house and grounds like something out of the Edo period with the modern conveniences concealed as thoroughly as the architect's and the builders' skill could arrange.

Yet as she knelt at the low table on which dinner was set out, Nanase Saya could not have felt more austere and oppressive surroundings had she been in a drafty castle of cold stone.

"I'm not surprised," her uncle Jiro was saying. "A woman is fundamentally unsuited to rule the day-to-day operation of a major corporation. Trying to force herself into the role of a male heir, I'm not surprised that Himemiya Chikane-san would do something as perverse as claim a female lover."

He reached for a sliver of grilled fish with his chopsticks while glancing meaningfully across the table at Saya.

"It's quite the scandal," Saya's mother agreed. Nanase Junko was the daughter of a Kyoto family with a bloodline that could be traced back to Heian-kyo...and no money. She had been, in essence, sold to the heir of Nanase Heavy Industries. Nanase Masashi was the son of a self-made man who'd risen to the top in the post-war industrial boom when existing firms in the field had been deeply suspect by the Americans. It was a classic trade—his money and power; her breeding, prestige, and social contacts benefiting both families.

Saya's conception had been difficult, from what she understood, following the miscarriages of two previous attempts. The fact that she was a daughter was to her parents' minds unfortunate but neither had the inclination to try again. Her father had his mistresses and her mother liked it that way. Like Chikane, Saya was her family's only child.

That, of course, was her uncle's point. Jiro was the younger son; ergo Masashi had inherited Nanase Heavy Industries from their father. But Jiro had three sons of his own, and he had ambition on behalf of his children.

"Even so, I think it is still too early to consider Saya's marriage," her father remarked. "A wedding following her university graduation would be best, do you not agree?"

"Indeed," Junko said. "Anything else would imply unseemly haste, either on Saya-chan's behalf or the family's, implying a weakness in the firm, ill health for Masashi-san, or a pending scandal. All of those are to be avoided."

"In which case," her husband continued, "then an engagement would be premature. Market conditions may change and an unfavorable situation would be the result."

As Saya had known for years, her parents' plan for the succession was to marry her to the younger son of a compatible family in business, politics, or society, who would then take the Nanase name and become Masashi's heir. Thus Masashi would get a male heir, insure his own bloodline would continue to the next generation through Saya, and forge advantageous new contacts for the firm's benefit.

Truthfully, the only reason Saya had not been to a half-dozen _omiai_ yet was because her father was too canny to leash himself to a bargain that could one day turn sour, making him choose between going through with it to the Nanases' detriment or the negative consequences of breaking it off.

What Saya thought of being bartered in an arranged marriage and used as a brood mare was not asked. Neither her father nor her mother was the type to ask questions whose answers were irrelevant.

"In the interim, however, don't you think it would be better to have a successor? The Himemiya situation just goes to show the risk involved," Jiro pressed his point. His visit, after all, was not coincidental or out of family feeling. So little the Nanases did ever was. "Several of the Board of Directors agree with me. It would help to reassure shareholders and business partners alike if the matter of the succession were to be settled at once."

Masashi shook his head.

"On the contrary, wouldn't that be seen as a panic move? A reaction to falling stock prices?"

"You cannot deny that they _are_ falling."

"A short-term fluctuation only. The market is reacting only to the similarities between the Himemiya Financial Group and Nanase Heavy Industries. Two family-run companies, based in Mahoroba, each with a single teenaged daughter as their only child. We have no projects at a critical juncture, so we need only keep on and the problem will be self-correcting as information replaces concern."

"Indeed," Saya's mother contributed. "The enhanced scrutiny will only serve to show how different Saya-chan is from the Himemiya girl."

Only long practice allowed Saya to prevent herself from showing any outward reaction.

"They are school friends, though, are they not? And that Ohgami girl as well. She could easily be stained by the association."

"Ojisama," Saya spoke up, "I do not wish to correct you, but Ohgami-san is not a lesbian."

"I wonder," Junko said. "Ever since she was a child, Ohgami Shizuka has carried on as if she were a boy. Then when you consider her older sister, it's plain that the family has become decayed and corrupt." She clucked her tongue sharply. "No, I'd not be surprised if Ohgami-san wants to become a man like Himemiya-san."

_Being gay and wanting to be a different sex aren't the same thing at all! _Saya wanted to protest. _And you can't make either assumption just because Arrow is a tomboy!_

Wanted to.

But didn't.

"The problem," her father spoke up, "is that precipitate action, a dramatic statement, will be perceived as a reaction to a crisis. _We_ are not the subject of the scandal; _our_ daughter has not humiliated her family through her shameful actions. If we act as if that were the case, then it will be assumed that we had to. 'No smoke without fire' is, I believe, the English saying. How much more proof would calling the fire department be?"

"That is precisely the reason why we have insisted that Saya-chan not drop the company of these girls despite their degenerate behavior. It would look as if we were acting out of fear."

"It's the same in business," finished Masashi. "Nanase Heavy Industries must be seen to rise above this tawdry affair rather than submit to it."

Jiro glowered at his rebuff.

"I think you're making a mistake. There's too much potential for serious losses. The Board agrees with me on this, oniisan."

"Then we will have to reassure the board. The Nanase name stands for strength of character. It's how our father built the company in the face of the old, corrupt, heavy-industry _zaibatsu_, and it's how we will stand tall while people like the Himemiyas crumble under the weight of decadent modern culture."

Saya wanted to scream at her father's pompous, sweeping statements, at the casual way he condemned her without knowing it.

But she didn't.

~X X X~

_A/N: You'll note that Himeko calls Souma "Ohgami-kun" here instead of "Souma-kun." That's because in the manga (which this story is based off), even at the very end, _while Chikane was killing him_, Himeko called him Ohgami-kun, unlike how in the anime she changes to calling him Souma as they become closer._


	5. Chapter 5

"Well, _I_ think the entire thing is disgraceful," Kyoko pronounced archly. "If Miya-sama—" She caught herself and continued, "If _Himemiya-san_ has sunk to the point that she's using her friends to get petty revenge, then we clearly were wrong about her this whole time."

"Kyoko-chan, I'm telling you that there is no way Nanase-sama would do that," Otoha snapped. "I said that yesterday." And that was even before Nanase had extended her personal apology to Otoha after school.

"Not on her own, no, but if Himemiya-san asked her to, that would be different. This was obviously done to humiliate you."

"Just stop it, Kyoko-chan," Otoha ordered. "Nanase-sama isn't some lackey who does whatever Himemiya-san tells her to. It was a stupid accident, that's all." Kyoko had been her friend since kindergarten, but really, the girl was such a gossip sometimes! And once she had a spiteful thought in her head, she'd be off and running like a horse with the bit between its teeth.

"_You_ brought it up."

"Actually, she didn't," Misaki corrected her friend. "She just asked if we knew any of the 'Seven Mysteries' for her article."

All around them the bustle of class before homeroom was going on—kids talking about the latest sporting event or TV show, poor students scribbling down copied homework, girls giggling over boys, boys bragging over girls. Kyoko gave in with bad grace.

"Well, all right. Um...I know about the Hungry Goblin, and the Ungrateful Girl and the Demon—I wish that stupid Kurusugawa would disappear. Everything was all right before _she_ came."

"I know those, too," Misaki cut her off, correctly sensing that the leader of their group was about to lose her cool.

"So do I," Otoha grumbled.

"Oh, but there's another one I've heard, about the basement stairs!" Kyoko spoke up eagerly, noting Otoha's growing black mood. "Sometimes there's an extra one and—"

"This isn't one of those stupid stories about how they count differently going up and down, is it?" Otoha said. "I don't want to write a story about people forgetting to count the top step when they're going down."

Kyoko flushed.

"It's nothing like that!"

"Thank goodness. All right, then, go on."

Kyoko sighed heavily.

"You know how there are twelve steps going down into the basement from the door in the central section?"

"No, not really. I've never actually been to the school basement," Otoha pointed out.

"Me, either," Kyoko admitted. "But...there's supposed to be twelve steps. Anyway, once a couple of guys were sneaking off from class and went down there instead of up to the roof. I guess they figured it'd be less obvious for the teachers to find them, and apparently they'd done it before. Only this time, there were thirteen steps instead of twelve, and the bottom step ended at a closed metal door.

"The guys figured that the janitor had found out that students were sneaking down there and locked up, but they tried the door anyway. It creaked open, grating on rusty hinges like it hadn't been opened for a long time. Behind the door, what they found wasn't the basement at all, but a long tunnel, with a concrete floor, lit by flickering bulbs and with water dripping from bare pipes to make pools on the floor here and there.

"This totally freaked the guys out and they ran for it, bolting back up the stairs, where they all but crashed into a teacher who, as you'd guess, wasn't happy with them running through the halls yelling and screaming. They tried to tell him their story, but when they took him back to the basement door, they found only the usual twelve steps leading to the same basement as there always was. So of course the teacher didn't believe them, and they were punished. But even now, every so often when someone tries to go down to the basement, they find that the stairs have a thirteenth step that takes them to a strange place that shouldn't be there."

Misaki shivered.

"Whoa, that's creepy, Kyoko-chan!"

"Does anyone know what the hallway is supposed to be?" Otoha asked.

"No, I don't think that anyone's ever had the courage to check it out."

"Or if they did, they never...came back?" gulped Misaki.

"This is great! Thanks, Kyoko-chan; it's exactly what I'm looking for. I'll have to do some research—maybe there's more to this story than just a spooky tale."

"L-like what?" the green-haired girl squeaked. Misaki was not good with ghost stories.

"Maybe there was another building here before the school was built," Otoha thought it over.

"Like a sanitarium or a prison!" Kyoko suggested excitedly. "Or some kind of laboratory where horrifying wartime research was going on! And it still manifests here today when the restless souls of the people who suffered and died there bring it back!"

"It's possible," Otoha said.

"Eeek! You're not serious!"

Otoha sighed.

"No, Misaki-chan, not that the spirits of the dead turn back time to plunge unsuspecting wanderers into the horrifying world of the past," she groaned, her sarcastic tone obvious. "I mean that if there _was_ something like that here once it would explain why there's a _story_ about it."

Misaki shivered.

"All I know is, you wouldn't catch _me_ going down to the basement alone now that I've heard this story. You weren't just making it up, were you, Kyoko-chan?" she asked meekly. Otoha wasn't sure if her friend wanted it to be real (and scary) or fake (and so a trick by Kyoko). What was worse, having your chain yanked by a friend or learning about something you were afraid of?

"Of course I wasn't! This is for Otoha-chan's project! Do you think I'd tell her something that would make her look stupid in front of Nanase-sama? Or let Kurusugawa get one up on her by pointing it out?"

"Geez, I was just _asking_. What's got your panties in a twist today anyway? Since when are you so pure and holy?"

"Well, if you weren't such a kid, jumping at shadows—"

"Enough!" Otoha cut their building tiff off before it could really get started. "Both of you, just give it a _rest_, all right? I really don't need this crap."

"Yes, Otoha-chan," they both said, looking abashed towards her, but shooting each other sharp glances.

It looked like it was going to be another ever-so-wonderful day, she thought sarcastically. Sometimes she wondered why she even bothered to get out of bed.

~X X X~

"Argh, pop quizzes make me wonder why I even bother to get out of bed," Arrow groaned.

"Tell me about it," Alice agreed. "I swear, Hayashiya-sensei walked across the hall from you guys and nailed us with the same one."

"She always does that. That way nobody gets a chance to tip off the rest of her classes what's coming up. So how'd you do?"

"87."

"Ha! Gotcha!"

"Seriously?"

"91." Arrow's grin was huge.

The girls were eating lunch outside by the tennis court that day. Chikane and Saya hadn't been able to join them due to student council business, so the other three friends hadn't gone to the rose garden. Somehow, it hadn't seemed quite right without Chikane—or maybe it was just that Chikane was the one who could get them out of trouble if they were caught in that off-limits area. Probably, Himeko decided, it was a little bit of both.

"Wow! That's really good, Arrow-chan!" Himeko said appreciatively.

"Thanks! I'm a lot smarter than I look, y'know."

Alice pursed her lips thoughtfully, then shook her head.

"Nah. Too easy."

"What is that now, eight straight math tests you've gone down in flaming defeat on, Alice? I don't think that puts you in any position to make wisecracks."

"The day I am not in position to make wisecracks is the day the sun stops moving," Alice deadpanned.

"Yeah, I guess without that, all you'd be is short. Besides, if you weren't sassy, they'd recall your hair or something."

Alice laughed.

"You're in good form today. I guess your math success has fringe benefits."

"Damn straight. Hey, how'd Himemiya do?"

"Need you ask?"

"Sure. I mean, Sensei might have run out of ink and only given her a 99 so she didn't have to write three numbers. What about you, Himeko-chan?"

Himeko beamed at her.

"I did really well!" she said happily. "Studying with Chikane-chan and the rest of you really helped!"

Alice blinked in confusion.

"Un...Himeko, not to be a downer, but when Hayashiya-sensei handed back your quiz, she said, 'Kurusugawa-san, this proves you're an honest person who doesn't cheat off your girlfriend.' That didn't really suggest a high score."

"It was a 68!" Himeko chirped.

"Okay, what am I not getting?"

Himeko blushed.

"I had to take every makeup test but one in math last year. This is about twenty points higher than my usual pop quiz average."

"So relatively speaking, you kicked ass."

"Mmn! Thanks to all of you. I'm really glad that Chikane-chan has such good friends."

"You know, that's the second time you've said that," Alice observed. "Remember, that very first day you came and we had lunch together? Miya introduced me as her best friend and you let out that big squee? Which was pretty impressive, considering that you were already floating on fluffy pink clouds at the time. Miya said...argh, I don't remember exactly what, but something about how you're not used to her having friends, right?"

"Uh huh."

"So, I figured it's one of those weird past-life things you two have going on. But...I don't get it. Sure, Miya's not the easiest girl to get to know; I swear she does the whole superhero princess routine so that everybody either admires or resents her and it saves her the trouble of having to actually deal with them as people, but...oh. You mean she used to be worse, don't you." She didn't phrase it as a question.

"Wow. That's actually kind of hard to imagine," Arrow said. "I mean, I've known Himemiya since we were kids and she isn't an easy one to get friendly with. Alice, here, pretty much genki-girled her into submission."

"Oh? Tell me, tell me!" Himeko urged.

"There's not that much to tell, honestly."

"Says you," Arrow said. "Hey, Himeko-chan, can I have one of those octopus sausages?"

"Sure; I never eat them all anyway."

Arrow snared one out of Himeko's bento with her chopsticks and popped it into her mouth. "Mmm, cute _and_ tasty."

"Not unlike Himeko herself, at least according to Miya."

Arrow nearly choked on the food.

"H-hey, take it easy with the mental images on the poor straight girl here!"

Alice giggled.

"Sorry!" she caroled, clearly nothing of the sort.

"I doubt it. But hey, you're just as much of a blushing virgin as I am, so gags like that'll just snap back into your face."

"True," Alice admitted with a sigh.

"You've...you've never...?" was as far as a blushing Himeko could actually get towards asking.

"Nope," Alice said.

"Me, either," said Arrow. "I mean, I really want to, but I want it to be with someone special. I'm not naïve enough to figure my first guy is going to be my last, but I'd at least want it to be so that at the time I couldn't imagine doing it with any _other_ guy, y'know?"

"Mmn, I do," Himeko said. Happily non-virginal herself since the day after she and Chikane had gotten things settled with their parents, she certainly couldn't imagine herself with anybody else. "I think you're right."

"Anyway, back to you meeting Himemiya, Alice..."

"Seriously, I don't know why you keep saying there's a story there. It's not like there's some series of hilarious mishaps or something."

"_Alice_!"

"Okay, okay," the redhead gave in laughingly. "So, I'm ten years old, and I've spent my entire life in Canada. Now, all of a sudden I get transplanted into a small town in rural Japan. I can speak the language, but I don't know the culture at all, all the zillion little things that a kid soaks up like a sponge while growing up. I mean, I'm _racially_ Japanese, but a foreigner is a foreigner, right? So, of course I'm feeling lonely and ostracized, since, well, I _was_ alone and ostracized."

She punched Arrow in the shoulder.

"Ow! What was that for?"

"Pushing me off the swingset!"

"Geez, I apologized for that like, five years ago!"

"She who dredges up old memories is she who must take what she gets."

"I thought it was Americans who were supposed to be wiseasses," Arrow grumbled. Himeko giggled.

"Anyway," Alice continued, "with the instincts of the stunningly intuitive and brilliant child that I was"—she paused for the obligatory snickering—"I zeroed in on Miya as the one member of the class who didn't think any less of me because I was foreign. Which as we all know now was because it's pretty hard for her to think less of certain _groups_ of people when you consider her opinion of the human race as a _whole_, but anyway I clung to her like glue from that point. I treated her like she was my best friend—I'd glomp her when I saw her in the morning, ask her about the stuff she was doing, chatter at her about my life—"

"Address her without an honorific," Arrow chimed in.

Alice smirked.

"That alone nearly made Mifune Kyoko pop a blood vessel, remember? She was all 'It's Miya-_sama,_ you stupid foreigner! Even if you can't act properly, you can at least do that much.' Whereupon Miya stood up and said, 'Come on, Alice, let's go get our lunch before they run out of sandwiches,' and walked right out of the classroom. I, of course, dashed right after her, and the rest is pretty much history."

"Meanwhile," Arrow said, grinning, "all the rest of us were still standing there staring because Himemiya had called her 'Alice' without an honorific."

"Of course, she'd actually done it because Mifune-san was being a jerk and she hates people taking her name in vain like that, but the funny thing was, we actually got to like each other."

"Mmn-hm," Himeko agreed, nodding. "I think someone like you is exactly what Chikane-chan needed, someone who could help her see the lighthearted side to life, the silly, the absurd or the just plain fun." _Someone to help her slow down and enjoy being alive, instead of just marking time until the next Orochi awakening_. "She's lots happier now than I've ever known her to be."

"That's...a really nice thing to say. Thanks, Himeko," Alice replied with a warm smile.

"Though the fact she's casually referring to a past life while saying it is a head-spinner," Arrow added, smiling broadly.

"Well, it only stands to reason. Miya got beauty, brains, athletic ability, poise, charm, wealth, and social standing, so why not a timeless love that spans multiple lifetimes? Some ordinary high-school romance would hardly suit her image."

"She's not that bad," Arrow protested, then glanced back and forth between Alice and Himeko before all three dissolved into laughter. "Okay, yes, she is. She's like a fairy-tale princess."

Himeko laced her fingers together.

"Well, if she is, it's because she's already gone through all the awful things that happen before happily-ever-after."

"Eh?"

"I'm guessing this past life wasn't the happy kind?" Alice asked.

"No, that's not—well, I mean—that is—" Himeko babbled, fluttering her hands helplessly. She hadn't meant to go there in the first place, having just said what popped into her mind. And how could she answer the question, anyway? It wasn't the previous life that was the problem, but the one before it, and going into all that would be laying bare Chikane's soul in a way that even good friends had no place to know.

She wondered if they'd even believe the story, about being the shrine maidens of Ame no Murakumo and about the Orochi and the things they'd had to witness and experience. Arrow might; she was the daughter of the priest of Ohgami Shrine, the keepers and guardians of the hidden shrine to Ame no Murakumo, whose role it was to guide the priestesses during those lifetimes in which their memories had been sealed. The others, though? Or people like Chikane's parents or Himeko's own?

_Chikane-chan never told anyone,_ Himeko thought, _even though she said we'd known each other in a past life. I guess that's the difference between a wild story and sounding plain crazy._

And in a way, it made her glad. While Himeko enjoyed hanging out with her new friends, it gave her a warm feeling to think that there was something private and special that she shared with Chikane alone. Even if the memories weren't always pleasant, they were things that the two of them had gone through together, things that had brought them to where they were now. She supposed all couples in love had those kind of moments, memories like shared treasures in their hearts. Her parents certainly did, showing it now and again by glances and shy smiles at odd moments.

It was an incredibly sappy thought, but she didn't feel embarrassed. After all, if she couldn't be sappy about a high-school romance, well, when could she be sappy?

"Yup," Arrow said, "she's off on Planet Himemiya again."

"No doubt lost in contemplating its natural wonders."

"Nah. No drool."

Himeko blushed, giggling. "You guys are _awful_!"

They grinned unrepentantly at her.

"It's all part of the service we offer," Alice said.

~X X X~

"Then we're all settled as to what needs to be done?" Chikane verified, sweeping her gaze around the circle of faces. That was where, she'd found, she was most likely to find the council's concerns. Often the lower-ranking members would be hesitant to speak up in opposition to the group and their president, but Chikane didn't want that. If there was a problem, she needed to be told about it, or if on reflection she believed the council's plans were correct, then she needed to know people's concerns in order to address them and put the others at ease.

This time, though, she saw nothing but nods of agreement.

"Excellent. We'll proceed as planned, then." Deftly, she squared the stack of papers before her and picked them up, then stood. "Thank you for coming, everyone; I appreciate all your hard work."

The council members began to gather their own things. Most of them had gone when Chikane called to her friend.

"Saya-san, could I speak to you for a moment?"

"Oh? Of course. We still have some time before class."

Chikane waited until the others had filed out of the council room before saying anything, which prompted Saya to speak up.

"Himemiya-san, what is it?"

Chikane held up a hand in a delaying gesture until the door had clicked shut behind the last member, leaving them alone.

"Sorry; I didn't want to speak up in front of anyone else, since it's private." She frowned slightly; this was not her best suit as a person or a friend. "Saya-san...am I causing trouble for you and Alice?"

Saya's eyes narrowed. She didn't waste her time on stammering out "What do you mean?" or anything similar. A slight frown creased her lips.

"What has Arisu-chan been saying?"

"Nothing. You know Alice, though. She's not exactly shy about hiding her feelings, even though she doesn't blab the specifics. It isn't hard to see that something is happening, and we all know that your parents are making things difficult for you generally. The deduction is a simple one."

It was interesting, Chikane thought. Both she and Saya were people who wore an elegant mask of social graces in front of the general public, and both of them were dating girls who were staggeringly transparent in their emotions. A case, maybe, of "opposites attract." Alice, of course, was much more assertive and outgoing than Himeko, but then again Saya was considerably more passive than Chikane so again the balance was preserved.

"And, if you're accusing Alice of complaining to me about how things are going with you," she continued, "then I guess I have my answer."

Saya's eyes flicked to the door, which was closed, and reached out towards the lock, even taking a step in that direction, then pulled back. Chikane could easily see the war within her: leave it unlocked and risk someone walking in while they were discussing Saya's lesbian relationship? Or lock it and risk someone trying the door and perhaps start wondering what Saya was doing alone with the school's most notorious homosexual that required the door be locked?

Watching her friend's struggle made Chikane's heart ache, thankful that Himeko had allowed her to be open about their relationship, that her parents were supportive and Himeko's at least not actively opposed, and that she herself had had the will to let her princess mask, her shield against having to cope with the pettiness of the world, fall enough to show herself. Part of her knew that it was unfair to compare the two of them, the Lunar Priestess who considered this lifetime one stop along the way and an ordinary girl who had no memories of supernatural evil or shattering despair or even just the added years of human experience, but she couldn't help it.

Saya dropped her hand and turned back to Chikane.

"Himemiya-san...I..."

She clenched her fist over her heart.

"These past few weeks, I've been so jealous of you sometimes that I can't even breathe. Ever...ever since I understood that I was gay, I've envied you your parents and how they seemed to accept that, but now that you have Kurusugawa-san, that I'm watching it in practice instead of just in the abstract, it's _awful_."

Her gaze flickered to the door.

"They watch me even closer now, and they always go on about how glad they are that I'm 'normal,' not like you or Arrow-san. Oh, yes, they're virtually convinced that Arrow-san is like us just because of how she acts and won't believe me when I try to defend her."

To Chikane, the fact that Saya had used the word "defend" spoke volumes.

"They don't like Arisu-chan anyway, because she's foreign-born; they only tolerated her because she was your best friend and it was good social sense to be friendly with the Himemiyas. But now that you've come out, they treat all of my friends as suspicious, as bad influences. I barely have any time to be with Arisu-chan as it is, and almost never alone."

"I'm sorry, Saya-chan. If there's anything I can do—"

"There isn't. It's not about you or Kurusugawa-san or Arisu-chan. It's just the facts of the Nanase family and what it means to be their daughter. That's reality. And I'm happy for you, I really am, but sometimes...you're perfect in academics, perfect in sports, in social popularity, in family background, in looks, but it's just too much that you should be perfect in being a lesbian, too!"

Chikane didn't have a response for that.


	6. Chapter 6

Chikane, Himeko noted, was pensive all the way through classes. She hid it well, responding when called upon by the teachers in her usual calm, even voice, and maintaining that general air of placid untouchability. But it wasn't a perfect illusion; the mask was fixed just a little _too_ tightly. Two lifetimes ago, Himeko would have missed it, but she'd learned her lover's habits better since then. Something, clearly, was worrying her, and she didn't have a chance to talk about it in the middle of the school day.

Unfortunately, they didn't have a chance to talk after classes were done, either, because Chikane had to stay late to speak with Morishima-sensei over some business as class representative, and so they didn't have any time before kendo practice. Worry over her girlfriend consumed Himeko's thoughts as she changed and ran through her warm-ups, until it finally came to roost during sparring. She was asking herself what could possibly have happened during lunch—_Is there something wrong with the student council? Did the administration ask her to resign as president because dating me makes a scandal?—_that she lost concentration and let reflexes take over.

This was something of a problem when Himeko's reflexes consisted of nearly zero practice at the sport of kendo, and several lifetimes' worth of being the vessel of power of the God of Swords. Her opponent was very surprised to find her _shinai_ flying out of her hand, her legs whipped out from under her by a follow-up slash to the knees, and only missed having her head chopped off her body in mid-fall because Himeko wasn't holding a real sword.

"Ah! Hachibe-sempai! I'm so sorry!" Himeko gasped, dropping her sword. The other girls in the kendo club came rushing around as well. "I lost track of what I was doing! Are you all right?"

Hachibe, a third-year student who was a second-_dan_ in kendo, groaned heavily and rubbed the back of her neck.

"...Ow."

"Oh, no!" Himeko started to panic. "Chikane-chan, is the nurse still here? We need to get—"

"Geez, don't make it worse," Hachibe said, her voice pained. "Though I'll take an ice pack gladly." She pulled off her mask, revealing her short lavender hair and squarish features. "Just for the record, if anybody thought Himemiya-_buchou_ and Kurusugawa-san were putting on an act when they had that _kenjutsu_ duel on Kurusugawa-san's first day in the club...yeah, no, they weren't."

Himeko extended a hand to the fallen girl; Hachibe clasped it and Himeko helped her back to her feet.

"Are you sure you're all right, sempai?"

"Yeah, I'm okay, really." She started to shake her head, then winced as the reflexive action obviously hurt. "Just don't do that in a real match, okay? It doesn't do us much good to have you destroy your opponent but be called for a foul."

"I'm really, really sorry, sempai," Himeko insisted again. "I let it all get away from me." She dropped her gaze to her feet. "I shouldn't be doing this. Someone could get really hurt if I get careless."

Hachibe winced again.

"I think that hurt worse than the butt-kicking I just took."

"Huh?" Himeko didn't get it at all. More than one other girl was giving her a harsh look as well. Alice, seeing Himeko's confusion and knowing it was genuine, took pity on her.

"Um, Himeko, before you got here, Hachibe was the third-best swordswoman on the team. You just talked about quitting because you were afraid that you'd hurt her if you didn't hold back. The rest of us may not be you or Miya, but we do have our pride, you know."

Himeko flushed scarlet.

"Oh, no, I didn't mean—I didn't—I wasn't trying to be insulting, really, I wasn't!" she babbled helplessly.

Hachibe gave her a long look, as if trying to divine whether she was really that ingenuous or putting on an act. She didn't say what conclusion she came to—maybe she was withholding judgment?—but instead turned to Chikane.

"I don't know if she's serious about that, Himemiya-_buchou_, but if she is, promise me you won't let her quit until after the tournament with Teshigawara Academy. I want to see Aina's face when Kurusugawa-san feeds her her sword for lunch before I graduate."

"We'll talk about it," Chikane said, then clapped her hands twice. "Now, everyone, back to practice. Hachibe-san, get some ice on that neck. Alice, please take over with Himeko. Oomori-san, will you take over for Alice with Suzuki-san? I'll sit out for now."

"Yes, _buchou_," Oomori said, and the knot of people started to break up.

"Arisu-chan, who is Aina?" Himeko asked while retrieving her sword.

"Ah, she's Hachibe's arch-rival."

"Arch-rival?"

"Mm-hm. They went to the same junior high, apparently, but to different high schools. Only, because Miya throws our lineup of fighters out of whack, they didn't get to face each other last year. She's Teshigawara Academy's team's deputy captain, so she'd face either Oomori-sempai or you in the tournament, depending on if we line up by club rank or by skill."

Himeko and Alice settled their masks back into place.

"So whatever Hachibe thinks about you right now, Himeko, you can bet she's just drooling at the idea of Aina stepping in to face you and having no idea what she's in for. Especially if you start out all nervous and shaky like you do, so she gets all smug about it right before you cut her down to size." Alice giggled. "In fact, I think if you did to Aina what you just did to Hachibe—_especially_ with the apologies—Hachibe could graduate from high school a fulfilled and happy woman."

"Arisu-chan, I don't _want_ to do things like that to people."

"You know, there is a reason we wear masks and armor and use bamboo practice swords in this sport," Alice pointed out. "I mean, we're sword-fighting here. It's kinda hard to do that without there being a certain amount of violence."

"I don't really _like_ violence and hitting people," Himeko protested.

Alice bonked her on the head with her _shinai_.

"Valid point, and if it's a problem then you really _should_ quit. But if you're going to stick around, whether for Miya's sake or whatever other reason, you should try your best, because otherwise you'll be letting the rest of us down."

"Plus, practice teaches you control, so you're not at the mercy of your instincts."

"Eep!" Himeko almost leapt out of her _tabi_, since Chikane's voice had come from about an inch behind her left ear. Alice giggled, while Himeko pouted (ineffectively, given the kendo mask) at her lover. "Chikane-chan!"

"It's true, though. I don't only study combat skills because I enjoy them. If I know what I'm doing, I can choose my responses instead of being guided by reflex. You wouldn't want to accidentally treat a mugger like you would Take no Yamikazuchi, after all."

"I..."

She had a good point. Mostly Himeko's reactions to violence were to stand around in stunned horror or cower in fear. But if someone she cared for was in trouble, and she happened to pick up a stick or something equally sword-like to try to help, she might end up really hurting somebody that she didn't mean to.

_And Chikane-chan wouldn't care about that for its own sake, would she?_ The Lunar Priestess might slowly be working her way back from the "high-functioning sociopath" classification, but she certainly wouldn't care about Himeko hurting some crook for the bad guy's sake, only because of the effect it would have _on_ Himeko, the guilt and empathy for another's pain.

It made Himeko feel suddenly warm and fuzzy inside. Wasn't that part of love, after all? To care about things one had no personal interest in, solely for one's beloved's sake?

"Okay," she said. "I'll do my best."

"Great!" Alice said. "Um, but try not to knock me down _too_ many times, okay? Miya might get jealous if you leave too many bruises on other girls' butts!"

Himeko was fairly certain that her blush even covered her ears.

~X X X~

While Oomori Naomi was busy with Himeko's antics in kendo practice, her brother was talking with Himeko's partner on the newspaper article.

"The seven mysteries of the academy? Yeah, I've heard of that, Kisaragi-san," he said as he changed his shoes. "But why ask me?"

"I overheard you talking with Hanadera-kun and Miyazaki-san last week about ghost stories."

"Oh, I guess we were kinda loud, huh?"

Otoha managed to suppress her immediate response ("yes, and it was really annoying!") in favor of a slightly milder and surprisingly more accurate version.

"Well, Miyazaki-san tends to be enthusiastic."

Oomori grinned at her.

"That's a polite way of putting it. So, you're curious about the 'seven mysteries,' huh?"

"I've been assigned to write an article about them for the school newspaper."

"Oh, I see." Oomori blinked as a thought came to him. "Hey, wait, is that a good idea? Isn't there a superstition that if you learn all seven of the mysteries, something will come and spirit you away? That's a key point of most 'seven mysteries' legends."

Otoha suppressed the urge to roll her eyes. She was not superstitious, at least not that kind.

"So what, the morning after the article goes to press, the whole student body will read it and vanish?"

He grinned at her, his sharp features making the expression look foxlike and cunning.

"You have to admit, that would make for one heck of a story. It'd make the national news. But yeah, I'm guessing it's probably not going to come true."

"So you'll help, then?"

"Sure. Let's see, there's a story about the basement stairs that sometimes have an extra step—"

"I know about that one already," Otoha cut him off, probably a bit more sharply than she ought to have.

"What about the Weeping Lady?"

Her attention perked up at once.

"No, I haven't. Can you tell me?"

Oomori rubbed his hands together.

"Sure, it's a good one. They say that the library's haunted by a ghost."

"Really? I never heard that before."

He nodded.

"Oh, yes. Well, it's only supposed to be heard in the spring, late in the evening. During the day, or at other times of year, everything is fine, but from April until June, when the sunlight starts to turn orange and gold after class, students visiting the library have heard the sounds of a woman's sobbing from behind the last row of shelves. As you know, there's a nook formed off the reading area by that one oddly placed wall and the magazine rack, and it's said that the crying comes from there. But when one goes to look, there's nothing there but a handful of crushed rose petals left on the table."

"Rose petals?" Otoha asked. "That's an odd detail. What does it mean?" There were a lot of little details in the story, as suited someone in the Literature Club, but that one stood out.

He shrugged.

"I don't know. If the Weeping Lady is a ghost, then maybe roses were her favorite flower or something?"

"Maybe." She frowned, pressing the first knuckle of her left forefinger to her lips, a habit she had when thinking hard about something. "It sounds like something I should look into a little more for the story. It would be better fleshed-out with some details."

"I see what you mean," the boy agreed. "I wish that I knew any."

"Not even something like, why is it only in spring, or when the story started?"

He shook his head.

"I'm sorry. Maybe some of the teachers might have a better idea, or the librarian?"

"I'll have to ask. Well, it's all part of being a reporter, whether it's a big scoop or a fluff piece."

"Well, good luck; I'll be interested in seeing the story."

"If I don't get mysteriously abducted while typing it," Otoha actually found it in herself to joke about it.

"Yeah, try to avoid that, Kisaragi-san," he replied with a quick smile. "Oh, hey, guys!" he called out, catching sight of three other boys from the class. "Wait up, will you?"

The hall being nearly empty, their voices carried back to Otoha as they walked away.

"So what was that, Oomori?" one started out. "A classic shoe locker love confession?"

"Don't be an idiot," another boy mocked. "Kisaragi-san wouldn't confess to some guy."

"I know that, dumbass, I meant Oomori, here. Kisaragi-san's cute, right? Not to mention stacked. Hell, if I were Miya-sama I'd tap that instead of the transfer stu—oof! What was that for?"

"General stupidity, Miyazaki," drawled the third of Oomori's friends.

"We were just talking about a project she's doing for the Newspaper Club about the school's urban legends," Oomori clarified.

"Oh, sounds kinda cool."

"I dunno," Miyazaki said. "Sounds kinda convenient. You probably interrupted her taping thumb tacks inside Kurusugawa-san's shoes or something and she just made it all up as an excuse."

One of them laughed—she wasn't sure which one—and the sound of a closing door cut off another one's sarcastic rejoinder. Maybe Oomori, at least, hadn't joined in the mockery, but that was little comfort against the rest of it.

Is that what people thought of her?

_Taping thumb tacks inside Kurusugawa-san's shoes_, like she was a bully in a generic shoujo manga.

What was it that Miya-sama had called her the day before yesterday? A _pushy, aggressive busybody?_

The world had turned on its head ever since Kurusugawa had transferred to Ototachibana Academy. Otoha's idol had had her feet turned to clay, and now rather than a fan of Miya-sama she was seen as...what?

_If I were Miya-sama, I'd tap that._

Boys talking behind her back, as if she were some jealous would-be girlfriend. A pathetic, laughable figure. At best an obstacle to someone else's happy ending important enough to be named in the credits.

She didn't realize until later that she'd had her hands clenched tightly enough that her nails were biting into her palms.

~X X X~

"Mmmmm!" Himeko squealed happily. "This is the great part about moving here after you've been here already. You know all the good places."

The subject of her ecstasy was a strawberry parfait; she'd always had a taste for sweet things and obviously this hadn't changed in this lifetime.

"One day, we'll have to take a trip to Chiba, and you can introduce me to all of your favorite places there," Chikane told her, smiling. She had her own ice cream in front of her, with her favorite raspberry and chocolate, but it was more fun to watch Himeko squee.

"Yeah! That'd be fun! We could go to the aquarium, and there's this really awesome amusement park where Kana-chan fell out of a bumper car and permanently saved me from being the worst klutz among my friends, and there's this really fancy Chinese restaurant that I always wanted to go to with you every time we drove past it—I think all the foreign investment executives go there, you know, from the electronics companies and stuff? Oh, and there's this street stall just opposite my middle school that makes the _best_ steamed buns ever. Oooh, I miss them! And the taiyaki at the Red Cat, and..."

Obviously being overcome by hunger, she broke off to spoon up an extra-big spoonful of her parfait, gulped it, and then winced, eyes crossing, as the cold induced brain freeze. Chikane couldn't help but giggle.

"You're terrible," Himeko mock-pouted.

"But you love me anyway, don't you?"

"Yes, with all my heart," she answered at once, without any hesitation or teasing. She reached out her left hand, the one not holding the spoon, and Chikane took it, their arms lying flat on the table so they could hold hands while they ate. Chikane could feel the slightly roughened places on the inside of Himeko's fingers and palms from her diligent practice at kendo.

"Hmm," Chikane mused, brushing her fingertips back and forth over those rough spots. "I hope you don't really want to quit the kendo club," she said.

Himeko looked up from her parfait, where she'd been trying to capture a strawberry in her spoon before it sank into the ice cream, and met her girlfriend's gaze.

_I could stare into her eyes forever_, Chikane thought.

"I won't insist if you really hate it," she continued, "but I hope that you'll keep trying."

"To raise my profile in school, you mean? I know that was part of your plan, Chikane-chan..."

Chikane nodded.

"Yes, that, but also..." She paused, then smiled sheepishly. "Well, I am the team captain, after all, and I want to win. With both of us, we might even make the national tournament."

Himeko blinked in surprise.

"Eh?"

"Did I say something strange?"

"Well, it's just...at practice, I didn't even think about that."

"You didn't think about helping the team win?"

"No, I mean, I didn't think about you caring about my helping the team win." She glanced aside, a little embarrassed. "I didn't even realize that was important to you."

"I am the captain," Chikane pointed out. "It's part of my job to think about how we can be our best."

"Mm-hm. But in our other lives, you never cared about that kind of thing."

"Oh?"

"Yeah! It was...you competed, but the match or your opponent really didn't matter at all to you. You were measuring yourself against some other, different standard entirely, that you made for yourself. You absolutely wanted to win, but, 'win' meant something different to you than the rest of us."

"That's...very insightful," Chikane said, surprised.

Himeko blushed.

"It's actually something Ohgami-kun noticed. It's probably because the two of you competed a lot, so I guess he could tell?"

Being reminded of Ohgami Souma never put Chikane in a good mood. It didn't matter that he'd been a good person, almost heroic as he fought off his Orochi nature to protect Himeko. He was a reminder that Himeko had had options, superficially better ones, and started Chikane down the path towards asking questions like "what does she see in me?" The kind of questions that got her hit in the head with a pillow in their last life when she'd brood about them.

Then again, she supposed she could turn it around. Himeko could have had a smart, handsome, athletic, brave, kind, and loyal young man and had decided that she would _rather_ have Chikane. You certainly couldn't say that Himeko had in any way "settled."

Yes, that was a better feeling.

_Not that I'll forgive him for getting to have Himeko's first (conscious) kiss!_

"It's true, though," Chikane admitted. "I guess I wouldn't have made a very good team captain in those days. I hope the archery club didn't regret having me." She paused, then smiled. "I guess that's a benefit of remaking the world without your own existence as part of it? Any mistakes that I made didn't happen anyway."

Himeko swallowed another spoonful of ice cream.

"I'm really happy that you have things that are important to you," she said with her sunniest smile.

"Will you still love me even when I'm not your sociopathic _yandere_ any more?" she teased, remembering what Himeko had called her two mornings ago. Himeko wadded up her napkin and bounced it off Chikane's nose.

"Anyway, I'm not going to quit the kendo team. I don't want to let everyone down, and you had a really good point, too, about learning to control myself in a fight. Besides, it's kind of fun to be good at something athletic. You should have seen my family's faces when I told them I'd joined. Just wait until they see an actual match!"

"I think they'll be impressed."

"Shiro is going to have to eat all his wisecracks. Unless I screw up."

"All the more reason to practice harder."

"Mm-hm!" She mimed a fighting pose with her spoon, then struck—and scooped out a spoonful from Chikane's parfait. Chikane giggled, and Himeko broke into another sunny smile.

"It's good to hear you laugh, Chikane-chan," she sighed happily.

"Thanks. But I warn you, keep stealing my chocolate and you'll find there's plenty of the old me left over!"

This time it was Himeko's turn to giggle.

"I'm glad you're in a good mood, Chikane-chan," she said as her spoon clinked against the bottom of the now-empty parfait glass. "Did you solve whatever problem was bothering you this afternoon?"

Chikane's eyebrows rose.

"You noticed? I thought I was doing a better job hiding it than that."

"You were. At least, I don't think anyone else saw, but I'm usually pretty good at reading you. Like Okaasan is like with Otousan; she can always tell when he's had a hard day at work even when he's trying to hide it to keep from disturbing our evening."

The idea that Chikane and Himeko had become close enough over their multiple lifetimes together to be compared to a mature, married couple made a warmth seem to grow in Chikane's chest. Thinking about the subject of the conversation, though, cut against that.

"Do you remember how I had to skip lunch with you because of a student council meeting?"

"Mm-hm."

"After the meeting was over, I tried to talk to Saya-san about Alice."

"Arisu-chan?" Himeko was obviously confused. Her ability to read people's discomfort seemed to begin and end with Chikane, which was much more like the Himeko that Chikane knew.

"They've been having problems lately. Saya-san's family is very conservative. I don't know if it's because they're _nouveau riche_ or if it's just the kind of people they are, but the fact that she's female has always been one strike against her, and there's no way they'd tolerate her being homosexual."

Himeko nodded.

"I know. You made sure to tell me so I wouldn't accidentally out her."

"Apparently the public nature of our relationship didn't just rebound on us and our families. It's causing Saya-san trouble, too. And you can imagine how that frustrates Alice. So I wanted to see if there was something I could do." She poked the tip of her spoon at the melting remains of her parfait. "We had a...well, I can't call it a fight, really, but it wasn't fun."

"Chikane-chan..." Himeko gave her hand a squeeze, trying to offer comfort, before she asked a question. "But how is it that we're making trouble for her?"

"For one thing, they're keeping her under even closer supervision than usual. For another, they're quite disapproving of Saya-san's friends. Alice is foreign-born, and Arrow an irreverent tomboy, so they've never liked them from the first, though Arrow at least had her family status to help mitigate that. The Himemiyas, of course, were rivals but peaceful co-existence with our wealth and power was seen as valuable, so I was the most favored of the three of us—until now, when I've been 'revealed' as a perverted deviant, and therefore not fit company for anyone."

"Things must be really uncomfortable for her."

Chikane nodded.

"I was trying to think of a way to help, but I couldn't. It's exactly like what happened to your father at work, except that time there was a solution since my parents could intervene. I was so foolish when I decided we'd be open about our relationship."

"You don't want people to know that we're dating?"

She shook her head.

"That's not what I meant. By foolish, I meant that I didn't think about the consequences didn't consider how it would affect people other than myself. I just grabbed for what I wanted when it was offered, selfishly. I might still have decided the same way—I don't think it's at all my job to live my life for the convenience of others—but I don't like that I blundered in without a thought and my friends are taking the heat from it."

"Oh, I see. Well, if there's anything I can do to help Arisu-chan and Saya-san, just let me know!"

Chikane nodded.

"I will."

"And remember," Himeko added sternly, "if something is bothering you, tell me! We're supposed to share each other's burdens, Chikane-chan, not have you do all the suffering just because you're better at noticing the bad things."

"Yes, ma'am."

"This isn't a joke! I'm not letting you get anywhere near that place you were at back then."

"Himeko, so long as you love me, it's _impossible_ for me to ever feel like that," Chikane assured her without even a trace of irony.

"Good, then here's a reminder," Himeko said, and startled her girlfriend by leaning across the table and giving her a peck on the lips.


	7. Chapter 7

Arrow Ohgami sighed into the warm spring night air after closing the sliding door behind her. The house at the Ohgami Shrine where the priest's family lived was traditionally Japanese-styled, with only a single Western-style room in the house, used for receiving guests that were dressed, or raised, improperly for Japanese furniture. She wondered sometimes if it was being raised in such an environment that had caused both her sister and herself to rebel in their own ways. Neither, after all, fit with the image of a "Yamato Nadeshiko," the traditional ideal of a perfect Japanese woman. _Tsu-nee would probably cut out someone's tongue for calling her that_, Arrow thought with a grin.

The quiet beeps of a videogame system echoed from behind the closed door, the crackle of energy weapons and the loud explosions hinting at the game's genre. Arrow glanced back at the door, then grinned, raising her arms up over her head and stretched. The sleeves of her kimono fell down her arms to her shoulders, and she chuckled to herself. _Yeah, the perfect Japanese beauty I'm not_. Most of the time that didn't bug her; Arrow liked who she was, and her parents didn't give her any grief about it. Her teachers at school, especially those who'd had her sister in class, were just glad that she wasn't an outright delinquent and took her schoolwork seriously.

Ever since Kurusugawa Himeko had come to Mahoroba, though, she'd started to have a few regrets about her choices. It had been one thing, when Himemiya had been patiently waiting for some past-life vision to drop into her existence, but now...Arrow had to admit that it bugged her to be the only single one in her group of friends. She couldn't help but wonder if the way she talked, the way she dressed, the way she acted, didn't keep the guys at arm's length. Not that she _wanted_ a guy who didn't have the guts to ask her out...

She shook her head. Arrow knew she was being dumb to be asking those things; it was just that she'd seen how Himemiya, Nanase, and even Alice got plenty of male attention. _Can we say ironic?_ she asked herself, since Alice was the only one of the three who even liked guys. But it was still stupid to want to change who she was for the sake of getting a boy. Particularly when it wasn't even a specific boy!

_It's just because of why I'm out here in the first place_, she decided. _I can hardly keep from thinking about romance when—_

She broke off her train of thought when she saw a figure coming down the drive into the courtyard. That was weird, for this time of evening especially. Was someone coming to visit the shrine? If so, then why pick such a strange hour?

Arrow got another surprise when the person got close enough that she could see who it was in the porch lights.

"Kisaragi? What the heck are you doing here?"

The drill-curled blonde, looking out of place in a sweatshirt and jeans instead of her school uniform, drew herself up sharply.

"I wasn't aware that I needed permission to visit Ohgami Shrine."

Arrow snorted.

"Hoping for some divine help to make you stop being such a rabid bitch? That's about what it'd take."

"And what would you know about it? Your father has to hire part-time _miko_ every festival since you won't help out."

"Oh, that did it. I know you've got zero ability to mind your own damn business, but that doesn't mean I have to stand here _in my own home _and take it from you." She marched down the veranda towards Otoha while she talked, stepping down the stairs to stand in front of her on the courtyard flagstones. "You're going to take that back this instant or believe me, you're going to wish you'd stayed home."

She'd already clenched a fist when Otoha did something that completely surprised her. The blonde dropped her gaze.

"I'm...sorry."

"What?"

Her head snapped back up.

"I said that I'm sorry, all right? I didn't mean...I didn't come here to pick a fight." She sighed, considerably more bitterness in the sound than Arrow would expect, then turned away. "This was a waste of time. I shouldn't have come here in the first place."

She actually got two steps back towards the drive when Arrow did something completely out of character.

"Hey, hold up a second," she said. "Why did you come here, Kisaragi?"

"What difference does it make?" Otoha shot back at her, not even turning around.

"Because you took the time and trouble to come up here in the middle of the evening, despite the fact that we get on about as well as oil and water. So it must have been important, right? You want to waste the trouble you went through without even saying what it was?"

Otoha stopped walking.

"No, I suppose not."

"Well?" Arrow prompted, hands on her hips.

It was weird, she thought, for her even to care. Arrow had always thought Kisaragi and her little Miya-sama fanclub to be pathetic nuisances who shoved their unwanted feelings onto Himemiya, being an irritant to their idol and occasionally a genuine problem for her friends. Arrow remembered one incident in middle school where they'd been bullying an underclassman who'd confessed her feelings to Himemiya and Arrow had been about twelve seconds from beating the living hell out of Ozawa Misaki over it.

_My head's going strange places tonight_, she said to herself.

"I wanted..." Otoha said more, but it broke off into mumbles.

"What did you say?"

"I wanted to ask for your help," she repeated, louder this time.

"Okay, that's a new one. Help with what?"

"You've heard that I'm writing a story on the Seven Mysteries of Ototachibana Academy for the Newspaper Club?"

Arrow nodded.

"Yeah, Nanase and Himeko mentioned it."

Otoha's brow rose in surprise. _Probably because I called Himeko by her first name,_ Arrow decided.

"I was hoping that you could help me with the project."

"Me?" Now it was the turn of Arrow's eyebrows to rise.

"Not for my own sake, of course, but for Nanase-sama and Kurusugawa-san's."

Arrow shook her head.

"That isn't it. I meant, I don't know much about urban legends and stuff. The supernatural isn't really my thing."

"But as the daughter of the priest of Ohgami Shrine, you must learn about when people come to seek help for supernatural problems, exorcisms and that kind of thing."

Arrow blinked.

"Kisaragi, I don't think that people come to a Shinto priest to deal with an urban legend. The only time I remember anyone asking for Otousan's help for anything having to do with the school was three years ago when they hired the new groundskeeper."

"Oh? What was that for?"

"The administration wanted him to do a blessing and clear any negative influences or something like that from the cottage."

Otoha let out a little gasp.

"Ah! You mean, that might have been left over after Kojima-san's suicide?"

"Yeah, I guess. I don't know if they were really worried about it or if they just wanted to calm down the new guy. He'd been hearing weird noises at night, scratches at the window, once or twice even _inside_ the cottage, and he was freaked out."

"D-don't make me laugh!" Otoha stammered. "Are you trying to tell me there was a ghost?"

Arrow rolled her eyes.

"Geez, Kisaragi, get a grip. I've got better things to do than try to screw with you that way. All I know is what I heard when the officials were talking to my dad, that's it. And I sure as hell don't believe it was Kojima-san's ghost or some evil spirit that had driven him to suicide looking for another victim, or any of that rot."

"But your father performed the cleansing, didn't he?"

"Sure. But the new guy quit anyway a couple of weeks after that, right? You ask me, he was just a superstitious guy who got spooked. I mean, Shinonome-san's worked there since then and he's never said anything about it, right?"

"Y-yeah, that's true. Still, if the administrators took the matter seriously enough to ask for Ohgami Shrine's help, do you really think that it was a question of just one man's nerves? There must have been more to it than that."

Arrow frowned. Kisaragi did kind of have a point. The principal and the teachers weren't superstitious people by nature, or so she thought. If the new groundskeeper had been babbling about ghosts, then the normal responses would be to tell him to quit complaining, or to have him move out and find his own residence if he didn't like the one provided, or in a worst-case scenario just fire him. Or if they believed he was hearing and seeing something real, wouldn't the first thing to investigate be student pranks?

"You might be right. I wonder if there were stories or something going around campus, and they wanted to reassure people with a public show. I mean, I didn't hear anything about the stories back then, but we were in junior high, in a completely different building."

Otoha nodded.

"That's true. We never really did hear all of the details, plus there were so many rumors going around at that time about Kojima-san's death that it'd be impossible for us at that age to be certain precisely what had happened. And the public media reports just said that he had been found in his cottage and, later, that the death had been officially declared a suicide. The precise details never became public."

"But now you're thinking that some of those rumors might be true—or at least widespread enough to make people nervous? That students were talking, and they wanted to put on some kind of performance to soothe people's feelings?"

"Not just the new groundskeeper, you mean, but the students in general, and probably even some teachers and parents?"

"Exactly."

Arrow had to give the other girl credit for taking her work seriously. She really sounded like she cared about learning the truth, not just going through the motions. Of course, that might just be because her Nanase-sama had assigned it, but even so it was more than Arrow had given her credit for.

_I guess even annoying fangirls can have some good points._

"Ohgami-kun..." she began.

"What?" Arrow prompted after a couple of seconds of silence.

"Would it be all right if I talked with your father about this, so he could tell precisely what he did and why?"

"Sure, although I have to say, he might not want to go into detail. If his client asks for discretion, they get it—he won't talk about the job afterwards."

Otoha frowned, lifting her hand to her lips.

"Which wouldn't be the case if the point was to put to rest the students' fears—but if that was the point wouldn't we have heard about it at the time?"

_Meaning, Otousan might consider himself promised to silence._

"You know who might know something, though?" a thought hit her.

"I can't read your mind," Otoha snapped back.

"Exactly what part of 'be polite to people who are doing you a favor' are you too much of a dumbass to get?"

The blonde winced, clenching her hands into fists.

"...I'm sorry."

Arrow blinked.

"Just like that?"

Otoha's head came up.

"What do you want, blood? It's not easy for me, either."

Arrow was not particularly sympathetic to the difficulty Kisaragi was apparently having in wrestling with her long-held instincts to act like a raging bitch. The fact that she was making the attempt at all, though, did surprise her, reinforcing her earlier thought about how Kisaragi really did seem to care about this project.

"So would you please tell me who might know?"

_The family legends say the world's supposed to end in the fall, but damn, that still felt like one of the signs of the apocalypse._ Arrow didn't say that out loud, though, which she figured had to count for something.

"Himemiya."

"Miya-sama?"

"Sure. Her family founded the academy and is still a major backer; her mom's one of the bigwigs in restructuring the academy's finances, and something like a third of the trustees are appointed by the Himemiyas. This kind of stuff is probably dinner-table talk for her."

A little shiver ran through the other girl.

"I couldn't just approach Miya-sama. She..."

Otoha didn't say any more, but Arrow figured that she knew well enough where she was going with it. Himemiya could get scary in defense of her friends, and if some of the fangirls' attempts at bullying Himeko (albeit half-hearted ones that never really got going) had gotten back to her, then a scorched-earth policy would pretty well be in place.

"Relax. Remember, Himeko's your partner on this, so Himemiya'll want this project to be a success for her sake. But, do you want me to ask her?"

Otoha swallowed, as if literally swallowing her pride.

"Yes, I would appreciate that."

"Cool; I'll call her when I go back to the house. I guess Himeko or I can fill you in tomorrow about what she's got to say?"

For a moment, Arrow thought that the blonde was going to ask why she couldn't just come in and wait while Arrow talked to Himemiya, or even talk herself once Arrow had made the initial request. The idea made a muscle in her abdomen twitch in fearful anticipation, but thankfully her fears didn't materialize.

"All right. I'll talk to one of you tomorrow, then." After a slight pause, she added, "Thank you."

"Don't mention it. Like I said, we want this to work out well for Himeko and Nanase's sake."

"...Of course," Otoha replied. "Goodnight, then."

"Bye."

Otoha turned and started heading back out the way she'd come. Arrow waited until she'd gotten some distance before she too turned back and headed up to the house. Her parents didn't like her using the family phone for personal calls with her friends ("That's why we pay for your cell phone, Shizuka-chan!") so she went back to her own room. Arrow glanced up and down the hall before she knocked three times quickly, then opened the sliding screen and stepped in.

"Don't worry, it's just me," she said hurriedly. Inside, Alice and Saya sat on floor cushions, hips pressed together, color high in their cheeks, hair tousled by hands running through it, lips slightly swollen. Quite obviously they'd sprung apart at the sound of Arrow's knock.

"What's wrong?" Alice asked.

"Nothing; I just needed to get my phone." Arrow walked over to her desk and picked it up off the corner where she always left it at home.

"You came in just for that?" Alice was a little put out, as she kind of had a right to be.

"Blame your girlfriend," Arrow said with a shrug.

"Me? Why?"

"We had a caller. The head fangirl herself, Kisaragi Otoha, came to ask me if I knew anything about that seven-mysteries story you assigned to her."

"She's here?" Saya gasped, eyes widening.

Arrow shook her head.

"Nah, relax. We swapped enough insults between actually talking about stuff that she left without us even getting out of the courtyard. I've got to say, though, she actually seems like she's taking it all pretty seriously. I guess you're a good influence. Anyway, that's why I needed to get my phone; I told her I'd call Himemiya and ask her if she knows more about the incident where Otousan had to perform a cleansing ceremony on the groundskeeper's cottage."

"Your dad did what?" Alice asked.

"Oh! The ghost of Kojima-san?" Saya said almost simultaneously.

"You've heard of it, Nanase?"

"Yes; it was quite a rumor among the high-schoolers in those days that strange sounds could be heard from the cottage when it was empty, and that things would even be moved."

"Oh, yeah!" Alice exclaimed. "Aniki told us all about that. He was a third-year in high school then, so he heard all the stories. There was supposed to be a poltergeist or something because the suicide couldn't rest in peace. He never said anything about there being an exorcism, though."

"I guess they didn't want to make a big deal out of it," Arrow decided. "Still, from the way you're both talking, it looks like the ghost story might really be one of the mysteries of the school. It's too bad, in a way. It seems kind of disrespectful to pull in something like a specific person's recent suicide. Stuff from fifty years ago or something, well, that's starting to sound like history, but this is fresh."

Saya nodded in agreement.

"The editorial staff and I will review the story closely to make certain what we publish stays within the bounds of decency and good taste."

"Well, I'd better go call Himemiya. I hope I didn't totally kill the mood."

Alice grinned.

"Don't worry, Arrow. We don't get enough chances to be alone together that I would let myself be put off by little things like a friend barging in and an interesting mystery." Suiting actions to words, she reached out, slid her arms around Saya's waist, and gathered the taller girl in close. Saya blushed at her girlfriend's boldness at not waiting for Arrow to leave, but she didn't pull away, either. Their lips touched just as Arrow slid the door shut behind her.

~X X X~

"Mmm! This is a really good cake, Chikane-chan. Where did you get it?"

Was it Himeko's imagination, or did Chikane actually look a little embarrassed?

"Ishigami-san baked it."

"Ishigami-san? Isn't she your family's housekeeper?"

"That's right. She studied as a _patissier_ before settling on a career in hotel management. Okaasama headhunted her from her alma mater, in fact."

Himeko remembered where it was Chikane's mother had gone to school.

"Your _housekeeper_ has a degree from _Tokyo University_?"

Chikane's grin was almost a smirk.

"My grandfather has been trying to steal her away for three years now. Actually, the management of a large estate like ours is virtually identical to managing a resort, except that outside guests are more intermittent. Well, and that we pay better. Mind you, Okaasama says that Ishigami-san's efficient management saves us far more than the salary and benefits premium we pay her."

The girls were at Himeko's home studying together once again. This time, Chikane had brought snacks for themselves and for Himeko's family, since she'd been battening herself on their hospitality so often. Himeko thought it must be kind of tricky for Chikane, since she didn't want to always be leeching off the Kurusugawas' food, but couldn't always be paying for things either since she didn't want to come off as if she thought she was some lordly creature descending from on high.

An occasional contribution of goodies was, however, quite welcome.

"Your mother seems a lot like you," Himeko decided.

"She has a better sense of humor."

"You have a good sense of humor, Chikane-chan. You just don't like to show it off around people you don't feel at ease with."

"Which includes most of the human race, yes."

"But now at least there's a list of exceptions more than just me. That counts for a lot."

Chikane cupped her chin in her palm, staring at her lover. Himeko wondered what she was thinking that put that playful little smile on her lips. _Oh, well, I'm just glad that she's happy. _She scooped up the last of her cake and finished it off.

"So, now that our digestive acids are breaking the cake down into its nutrient components to fuel our bodies, shall we follow the example and take on our chemistry homework?"

"Chikane-chan!"

"Now, Himeko, you know that there's a test next week and if you don't have the formulas—oh, that's Arrow's ringtone," she cut herself off as Mozart's _Requiem_ began playing from her bag.

_Saved!_ Himeko thought. Chikane dug out her phone.

"Hi, Arrow. No, I'm not too busy; Himeko and I were just studying. In fact, you're saving her from the evils of chemistry."

"Hmph!" Himeko sniffed.

"What was that? Kisaragi-san came over to your house? She didn't find—oh, good. That would have been awful the way things are now with Saya. What was she doing there, though?"

Chikane fell silent for a while, obviously listening to a fairly long explanation.

"So you promised her you'd call me? About what? Hm...I see. Oh, actually, yes, I do know. It's a sad story, really. I think you're right about publishing being a problem; although the teacher involved left the area right afterward, this is still the era of the Internet and it might cause her embarrassment or real harm if names are mentioned. Anyway, did you want the details? All right, I'll tell her, then. Good night, Arrow."

She ended the call and put away the phone. Himeko was burning with curiosity at about five different things Chikane had alluded to, but held her tongue.

"You can ask, you know; it won't offend me."

Himeko let out her breath, then grinned.

"Was I that obvious?"

"Well, not so much as a neon sign would be."

"Oh, you." Himeko stuck her tongue out at Chikane. "But okay: why did Kisaragi-san go to Arrow-chan's house; I didn't think they got along? What didn't she find out and what did it have to do with Saya-san? What's the sad story, what did you mean about being published, and why did you say that you'd tell Kisaragi-san about it?" She inhaled, having let it all tumble out of her in one rush of breath. "Geez, that sounded like I was an awful gossip, didn't it?"

"Maybe a little."

Himeko had the grace to look a little embarrassed.

"Sorry."

"It's okay. If it was something I didn't want to have you know about I would have excused myself from the room, although when you get down to it I _would_ tell you anything if you asked."

It always made Himeko a little nervous when Chikane started throwing around absolutes like "anything" or "never," because she knew that while most people used those words as hyperbole, the Lunar Priestess meant them literally. She let it pass, though, since there wasn't anything presently in front of them as it was.

Besides, she'd be a terrible hypocrite to complain, since she was the exact same way about Chikane. Himeko might not have the capacity to _do_ "anything," but her willingness to suffer, to endure, was in no way less than Chikane's willingness to act. The immovable object to Chikane's irresistible force.

"Anyway, it seems that Kisaragi-san went to Arrow's in connection with that project the two of you are working on, to ask about any stories Arrow might have heard in connection with Ohgami Shrine. There was one incident where her father had to perform a ritual of cleansing and purification at the request of the school administration, and the two of them remembered some ghostly rumors from the time. Arrow didn't know the details, though, so she called to ask if I had."

"I guess you did?"

Chikane nodded.

"Yes, because the Himemiya family is so involved with the funding and administration of Ototachibana Academy. That's how, for example, my then-grandfather was able to use it as the center of his plan to gather and control the Necks of Orochi two lives past. I heard all about it."

"Was it a...a ghost?" Himeko squeaked.

"I don't know. It might have been."

"Eep!"

"Mostly, though, it's just a sad story about unfortunate people who made some bad decisions but also had bad luck. I don't think it's something you'll enjoy hearing. Do you still want me to tell you? I said I would, but I can tell Kisaragi-san instead if you'd prefer."

Himeko shook her head.

"Mmm-mm, no, that's sweet of you, but I'm a big girl, and besides, I'm going to have to take pictures and I'll need to know the story to compose the best shots to fit the mood."

"Always conscientious." Chikane smiled at her.

"What was bad about Kisaragi-san finding something out, though?"

"Oh, that. Saya-san and Alice were over at Arrow's, ostensibly as friends hanging out together, but really it's so they can have some time alone with each other. Alice's house is really too crowded, and of course the Nanase home is completely out of the question."

"I'm just glad they have supportive friends like you and Arrow-chan. But I feel really happy we don't have to sneak around like that, catching stolen moments together when we can. I feel like I should do something nice for your parents to thank them, since it's really because of them that we can go on so easily."

"Make sure to tell Okaasama that on Sunday; I think it will make her thrilled. Now," Chikane said, swinging her legs under her in a kneeling position and patting her lap, "come lay down and I'll tell you the story."


	8. Chapter 8

"From as long as I can remember in this life up until three years ago," Chikane began her story, "the groundskeeper at Ototachibana Academy was a man named Kojima Kouichi." Himeko had curled up alongside her, head in Chikane's lap as she'd requested, and Chikane's hand rested lightly on her lover's head in turn. "He lived in the cottage provided by the school, as he had no family. Obviously I did not know him well, but he seemed to be a loner, the kind of man who rarely socialized even with the other maintenance workers, unlike the rest of his staff. He always had a cat, though. Two, actually, since the first died from old age when I was twelve and he got a new one."

She fell silent for a moment, and Himeko spoke up.

"So you didn't know him very well either, Chikane-chan?"

"No, and I do feel bad about that. Not _guilty_; I was only a child, after all, but it was a tragedy, and I suppose the fact that I let it pass by without even knowing it was happening until after it was over is a sad thing."

Himeko gave a startled gasp.

"Is something wrong, Himeko?"

The strawberry blonde turned over so she could look up at Chikane. She had a very searching expression.

"W-what's wrong?"

"You sounded like you were being Miya-sama just then."

"Oh? But why—" She broke off, realizing what Himeko was getting at, and couldn't help but chuckle at her own expense. "Poor Himeko. I can't imagine what it must be like to put up with me if your first instinct when hearing me express concern over people's troubles is to assume I'm being polite and concealing my true feelings from you."

"I'm sorry; I didn't mean to insult you," Himeko squeaked.

"It's all right, really. After all, it's been two lifetimes since I spent any time concealing my heart from you; I'd be worried, too, in your place. But no, those simply were my real feelings."

"Really? Really and truly, Chikane-chan?"

She smiled indulgently at Himeko's hopeful voice.

"Really and truly, Himeko. Though I have to say, if you're going to be this surprised every time I show kindness, caring, or basic human decency, you're going to seriously damage my ego."

"Oh, you."

Chikane twined a strand of Himeko's hair around her fingertips.

"It's your fault, you know. You grabbed on to me and gave me everything I could ever hope for and showed me that there was happiness and goodness to be found in the world. If you thought that this world had value, then how could I not start to see it? So if I surprise you now and again, you have only yourself to blame."

"Chikane-chan," Himeko cooed happily and nuzzled into her girlfriend's lap.

"In any event, to get back to the story, in May of my second year of junior high, so almost exactly three years ago, Kojima-san was involved in a scandal. He and a teacher were having a love affair and were caught at it."

"Why was that wrong? They were both adults, so that shouldn't be bad. Or was the teacher married?"

"No, she wasn't, and the academy doesn't have a policy against staff dating one another unless one holds a position of authority over the other. The problem was that they were caught _in flagrante delicto—_"

"What does that mean?"

"In the act of making love."

"Oh." Himeko blinked at that.

"They were in the library in a secluded spot, after school hours. Thankfully, it was the assistant librarian and not a student who interrupted them, so it wasn't as bad as it could have been, but obviously it was completely unacceptable behavior and they were both fired immediately."

"That's so sad; it reminds me of Arisu-chan and Saya-san."

"Not exactly, Himeko." That would have been a romantic tale of star-crossed lovers, but it just wasn't so. "Our friends have to worry about their parents, the fact that they're still teenagers, and the stigma of a homosexual relationship, all of which limit their options. Kojima-san and Higashiyama-sensei, on the other hand, were heterosexual, single adults and so had many choices. They could have gone to a love hotel, to her apartment, or even right there on school grounds to his cottage. For whatever reason, they ignored those possibilities, made a very bad choice, and had to suffer the consequences."

"Oh. I hadn't thought about that."

Chikane gently slid her hand along Himeko's hair.

"It's still a sad story, though. Of course with something like that on her record, Higashiyama-sensei was all but finished in education, and Kojima-san had in one fell swoop lost his home, his lover, his job, everything that made up his life. The very night he was fired, he went back to his cottage and hung himself."

"Ah!" Himeko squeaked.

"The ghost rumors started not long afterwards. The school tried to keep the details as quiet as they could, and were able to generally suppress the _why_ of it, but even so there started to be rumors of strange noises being heard from the cottage. They didn't really take off until the new groundskeeper was hired three weeks after the suicide. It didn't help that he seemed to have been a very superstitious man, uncomfortable living in a home whose previous occupant had killed himself. In my opinion, he should never have taken the job in the first place."

"I wouldn't have wanted to!" Himeko agreed. Chikane barely suppressed a giggle at how a girl who had faced down a demon-god capable of literally shattering the planet was scared of ghosts. "He must have been desperate to find a job."

"I don't know his personal circumstances, but I do know that he quickly began to complain about ghostly events, particularly poltergeist activity—objects being moved or disturbed, small items vanishing, a couple of times food left out being apparently eaten. There was no sign of anyone breaking in, and locking the door didn't seem to help."

"So is that why they asked for Reverend Ohgami's help?"

"That's right. The administration didn't really believe in ghosts, but they hoped it would calm the groundskeeper's fears and quiet rumors among the students. Of course, if there really _was_ some evil force, be it the ghost of Kojima-san or something else then there would be an additional benefit. We both know that there's more to the Ohgami family's arts than faith alone."

"Mmm. Look at what Minako-san did."

Chikane winced.

"I'm sorry; I didn't mean to remind you of that."

Himeko turned so she could look up at her lover.

"Why?" she asked, plainly confused. "Isn't it a good example?"

Chikane flicked a wisp of hair away from Himeko's forehead.

"No, it's a good example. I just thought it might have bothered you, after what she did."

"Mmm-mm, no, it's fine. I mean, it all turned out all right, and I'm sure she had a happier life in this new world. I wouldn't want to go through it again, but it doesn't bother me to think about it."

"That's good. I'd hate to hurt you with my clumsy tongue."

"Being clumsy is my job, Chikane-chan! It's not nice to try and steal my specialty."

They both laughed at that, happy to share the moment. Himeko's smile vanished, though, and she nervously tried to bring them back on topic.

"So, did anything..._happen_ when Reverend Ohgami performed the ritual?"

"Not that anyone ever talked about. Whatever was done, though, didn't seem to work. The groundskeeper quit within a week. That's when the school hired Shinonome-san, the present groundskeeper. He completely redid the cottage's interior, moved in, and hasn't had any trouble since so far as anyone knows. He certainly hasn't complained about any occurrences, and the rumors seemed to die down as well."

"Then it wasn't what Reverend Ohgami did, but when Shinonome-san was hired that ended the haunting?"

"I suppose that you could put it like that."

"I wonder if this even counts as a mystery of the school, then? It was definitely something real, but it's not a story that lasted a long time, and it doesn't seem to exist any more. Can there be such a thing as a former mystery?"

"I don't see why not. I suppose it's something that you and Kisaragi-san will have to consider when you are preparing your story."

"Hmm." Himeko thought for a bit. "Then, it's the story of Kojima-san and Higashiyama-sensei's affair that we'll have to be discreet about if we do use it for the paper?"

"The details wouldn't do anything but give titillation to the readers, and might cause embarrassment to the academy or even Higashiyama-sensei, wherever she might be now."

"Mmm-hm," Himeko made little noises of agreement. "I don't think it's right to bring up an old scandal without reason. But the ghost story is kind of creepy, and it really happened. It's not like the rose garden or the classroom stories where we know why they exist. It's a lot to think about."

"Well, then you should probably put it aside until tomorrow, because you also have a lot of chemistry to think about."

Himeko sighed.

"Chikane-chan, you're terrible!"

Chikane leaned over and pressed her lips softly to Himeko's.

"You can have a kiss every time you get one right," she offered. All of a sudden, the strawberry blonde found that studying seemed a lot more attractive.

~X X X~

The hiss of water from the shower echoed through the girls' locker room as Alice put the finishing touches on her uniform, pulling the knot tight in her ribbon-like tie. As usual when she didn't have help, the knot was crooked. She let out a heavy sigh; really, the Ototachibana uniforms were just ridiculous!

"Ishida-san?"

She turned away from the mirror to see Kisaragi Otoha watching her expectantly.

"You're here to see Himeko?"

Otoha nodded.

"Yes, is she still here?"

"Yeah, she and Miya are still in the shower."

The blonde flushed a little at that, making Alice laugh.

"Geez, Otoha, I didn't mean it like _that_!"

"That's not—" she snapped back, then gave up, perhaps realizing that continuing the conversation would just leave her vulnerable to more mockery from the redhead.

"Good, because if you started _those_ kind of rumors your butt would be kicked twelve ways 'till Sunday. I just got done first, probably because there's less of me to wash."

Otoha looked at Alice curiously for a moment, then glanced over at the showers and back again.

"Doesn't it _bother_ you?" she finally asked in a low voice.

"Doesn't what bother me?" Alice replied with mock innocence. She actually had a pretty good idea what she was being asked, but she definitely was going to make Otoha put it into words, if the blonde had the guts.

"Showering in the same locker room with Kurusugawa-san."

_Apparently, she has more guts than I thought. Or sheer gall, maybe,_ Alice said to herself. Outwardly, she just laughed.

"Kisaragi-san, Miya's my _best friend_. I've known she was gay since we were _twelve_."

"And you don't mind..."

"What, you think that just because they like girls they're going to sit there leering at me like a piece of meat? That's not about being gay or straight, it's about being a jerk or not." She gave Otoha a nasty little smile. "If anyone needs to worry, it's Miya. How many years have her fans stared at her, memorizing every detail of every curve, hmm?"

Otoha flushed scarlet.

"That's not—I'd never—I'm...I'm not—"

"Arisu-chan, are we late?" Himeko interrupted, emerging from the showers.

"That depends; how are you at speed-dressing?"

Himeko giggled.

"You remind me of Mako-chan. That's a good thing, by the way. She used to be my best friend. Oh! Kisaragi-san, I didn't know anyone else was here." She glanced down at herself to make sure her towel wasn't slipping.

"She was asking for you, Himeko."

"For me?" She blinked in momentary puzzlement, then caught on. "Oh, of course, about the story. But how did you know I'd be here?"

"Because we run with 'Miya-sama.' It's well-known among her fans that Miya runs in the morning, and so most of them know that you've joined us. Lots of times people would actually turn out to watch her. Anyway, since obviously we wouldn't come to class all stinky and sweaty, Kisaragi-san would know you'd be here before homeroom." Alice gave a theatrical bow. "Elementary, my dear Himeko. Quite elementary."

"Wow, it's amazing how many people like Chikane-chan! Well, not really amazing, because _she's_ an amazing person and it's easy to see why someone would want to be a fan, but still and all the _number_ of them always makes my head spin even though I'd think I'd be used to it by now, and yet she's still like a celebrity—"

"Proving yet again that even those closest to Miya-sama are not immune to being reduced to a babbling wreck by her aura of brilliance and beauty," Alice commented dryly.

"If Alice is calling me 'Miya-sama,' then I must have done something horribly embarrassing," Chikane remarked with a laugh as she emerged.

"Just putting people into a hearts-and-flowers trance without even being in the room."

"Sorry for babbling," Himeko squeaked.

"At least you have something worth babbling about," Alice opined, patting her on the shoulder. "Now, if people wouldn't mind, I need to get to homeroom. I promised Miura I'd let her borrow my English notes. Don't be late yourselves; Himeko can't learn to not obliterate people by reflex if she's serving detention during kendo practice!" She waved and dashed for the door.

"Eep!" Himeko gasped, realizing the time. "Is it okay if I tell you the story while I get changed, Kisaragi-san? Or would you rather wait until lunch?"

"Since I'm here anyway, I'll tell her," Chikane suggested. "That way she'll hear the same thing that you did."

"Oh, all right. That's good; I'm not really good at telling a story while doing something else, anyway. Would that be okay, Kisaragi-san?"

"Yes, of course, if Miya-sama—I mean, if Himemiya-san—"

"Very well, then." Chikane reached for the edge of her towel, and Otoha spun around, resolutely keeping her back turned until the couple was finished changing.

~X X X~

Himeko let out a sigh as she measured out the proper amount of the reagent into the test tube. Her lab partner, a spiky-haired blond boy named Sugimoto, caught the direction of her gaze and grinned.

"Wishing Miya-sama was your lab partner instead of Ishida's. eh?"

"That's not it," she hastened to assure him. Which was technically true; even though she _did_ wish Chikane could be her lab partner she had at that moment just been trying to remember what Chikane had told her the night before about what they were doing.

Sugimoto chuckled, misinterpreting her.

"Hey, you won't hurt my feelings. Everyone's jealous of Ishida-chan during chem lab and it's got nothing to do with Miya-sama being hot. It's a waste the way it is, y'know; Ishida-chan can get good scores on her own."

"Sorry you ended up with me," Himeko told him sheepishly.

"I'm just surprised the teacher paired us up. I mean, I thought they'd want to limit the number of possible explosions, not encourage them."

Himeko giggled.

"I don't get it myself. These lab experiments are supposed to be time-tested demonstrations of the basic principles we've already learned in class, right? Yet I get a hold of them and they never work...um, do we add the crystals to the liquid or the other way around, Kurusugawa-chan?"

Himeko checked the instructions.

"Um, I think we put in the liquid first..."

"Okay, go ahead."

She added the reagent to the beaker sitting over the Bunsen burner, and then he added the white powder.

Powder?

"Sugimoto-kun, shouldn't that have been in crystals?"

"Huh, what? Oh, frak. Hey, why is it bubbling?"

Himeko glanced at the instructions again.

"Um, I don't think I was supposed to turn the heat on until after all the components were added," she said nervously.

They looked at each other, eyes very worried behind their safety goggles. Until the rising clouds started making it difficult to see.

"Look out!"

Twenty minutes later, Himeko was sweeping up broken glass into a dustpan while Sugimoto was trying to remove caked-on stains from the lab counter with a scrub brush.

"At least the ventilation fans worked so that the sprinkler system didn't kick in?" the boy suggested. "And most of the class was happy to get out of lab work, so we helped our friends, if you look at it the right way!"

Himeko laughed.

"I've never heard anyone describe one of my disasters quite like that before."

"'One of' your disasters, eh? So this isn't your first time?"

"I'm not really great with the hard sciences," she admitted. "Though I'm good at developing film and that kind of thing," she said curiously, "and that's just a different kind of chemistry project. I wonder why that is?"

"Maybe it's because you don't have my inimitable help?" he said, grinning.

"Well, we did work together on this one. Hey, part of why we have lab partners is to teach us teamwork and group-building, isn't it?"

"Yeah." Sugimoto grinned suddenly. "Yeah! Good point, Kurusugawa-chan; we couldn't have done all this without both of our contributions!"

"...I don't think the counselors will put that in as a positive thing on our transcripts, though."

"Probably not, but hey, at least we know the truth." He paused, then added, "You know, you'd think I'd be better at cleaning up stuff like this by now."

Himeko had often had the same thought herself.

Still, embarrassing disaster or not, she had to admit that she was having fun. It was nice to be treated as herself and not just as Chikane's girlfriend.

"Say, Sugimoto-kun..."

"Yeah?"

"Do you know anything about the seven mysteries of the school?"

"Huh? You mean like the way our homeroom's supposed to be haunted by a girl who was spirited away by a demon and will make you take her place if you go back after class for something you forgot?"

"Yes, like that."

"Hm, I guess some girls are into that stuff, huh? Well, some guys, too, but mostly girls. Ghosts and vampires and all that. Curious because you're a transfer student?"

Himeko shook her head.

"No, it's for a club project."

He scratched his head in confusion.

"Huh, the kendo team is doing a project on the school's ghost stories? I don't get that."

"Mmm-mm, it's for the Photography Club."

"Oh, that makes more sense. Are you going to take pictures of all the haunted spots or something?"

"That's right, in connection with a story being written for the school paper."

"Ah, I get it. Wait a minute, what about the curse? Isn't there a story that anyone who knows the secret to all seven mysteries will be cursed to die in the same way as the last one learned?"

Himeko's eyes widened.

"I hadn't heard that!"

"You hadn't? I thought it was pretty normal for those seven-mysteries stories, after all."

"It is?"

"Yeah, like in manga or horror movies, there's always some curse if you learn all of the mysteries. Though I'm not quite sure how 'die in the way of the curse' would apply to some of them, like the rose garden or the goblin people leave food for in the science wing. Our mysteries are a lot less morbid than the ones in stories."

"So maybe there isn't a curse?" she asked hopefully.

"Maybe not. Heck, I hope not, if you're going to put them in the paper for us all to learn!"

"Do you know any of the other mysteries? I've already learned about the 'Haunted Rose Garden' and the 'Hungry Goblin,' but I'd like to find out as much as I can."

"Sure. Hmm..what about the 'October Confessional'?"

Himeko shook her head.

"No, that one's new to me."

"Oh, cool, and it's one of the best!" He dropped the cleaning rag and rubbed his hands together gleefully.

"We probably ought to keep cleaning, though. Minamoto-sensei will get mad if it's not all ready for the next class."

Sugimoto sighed.

"You're probably right, at that." He sprayed a fresh shot of cleaning solution and went back to scrubbing. "Anyway, back to the story. They say that it happened during the academy's fall culture festival. Oh, do you know about that? We have two of those a year, one in the summer that's more like a fair, and one in the fall that's the usual kind of thing where the different classes have activities and so on." He grinned at Himeko and added, "If you can get Miya-sama to volunteer for a maid cafe, by the way, you'll have the entire student body in your debt."

Himeko imagined that for a moment and then decided she'd better not be having those kind of thoughts in school if she didn't want to end up part of another scandal.

"That sounds like a nice idea," she remarked, though she suspected her face was giving her away. At least Sugimoto seemed to think so, since his grin grew into a full-fledged smile.

"Damn, Kurusugawa-chan, you're all right." She wasn't sure that was necessarily a compliment, since it seemed to mean "have an equally pervy interest in seeing Chikane dressed up in a sexy costume," but since she couldn't really _deny_ it, either, Himeko decided to take it in the spirit offered.

"Anyway, about that story," Sugimoto continued. "It was at the time of the fall festival, and a girl was walking home when she suddenly found herself surrounded by a fog bank that seemed to spring up out of nowhere. She blundered forward through the mists for a while until she found herself face to face with what looked like a chapel.

"At first, she thought she'd gotten lost in the fog and somehow ended up at the campus chapel, but she soon realized that this was a different building altogether. The walls seemed to be made of a strange, purple stone, and the doors and windows were strangely arched, almost more like Middle Eastern architecture than the European-style designs she knew. Weird hymn-like music issued from the open door, and almost against her will she was drawn to enter."

Himeko shivered, spilling glass back onto the floor.

"That's really creepy!"

"Take it easy, Kurusugawa-chan. I mean, it's just a story, right?"

"Yeah," she sighed out. "I guess so."

"You want me to stop?"

"No, it's okay. Keep going."

Sugimoto shrugged.

"Okay, it's up to you. Anyway, the girl walked up the aisle between the pews and, standing before the altar, was possessed by an almost overwhelming urge to kneel and confess her sins before God. As she dropped to her knees, the figure of a woman emerged from the shadows and stood before her, wearing the habit of a nun. The girl began to confess all her secrets, from how she'd joined in bullying an unpopular girl to shoplifting a CD from a music store—I guess this was before digital went big." He stopped and sighed. "Sorry; I've gotta stop saying stuff like that in the middle of telling the story. It kinda blows the mood all to heck, right?"

"I really don't mind!" Himeko assured him at once with a sheepish grin. She was just fine with a horror story _not_ having the proper mood!

"Okay. Well, anyway, she confessed everything that she'd done, and then the nun raised her hand and chanted, 'May the punishment of the Lord descend upon this wicked sinner!' Then there was a great flash of light and a clap of thunder, and the girl was blasted senseless."

"Was...was she killed?" Himeko asked. "No, wait, she couldn't have been, or else who told her story?"

"Yeah, she wasn't killed, but woke up lying in an empty field way down at the bottom of the hill towards the village. She had no idea how she'd gotten there, it was over two hours since she'd left the festival...and her clothes were all scorched and burnt and her cell phone's circuitry fried, just as if it had been subjected to a powerful electric shock. And ever since then, many people have reported stumbling across this chapel during the month of October and being forced to submit to Heaven's punishment for their sins."

"Did you say October?" Himeko pounced.

"Yeah, the chapel is supposed to only appear during October. That's why they call it the October Confessional."

"I wonder..." Himeko mused.

"Does that mean something to you?"

"I'm not really sure; I'll have to ask Chikane-chan about it, but it does give me an idea. Thanks a lot, Sugimoto-kun!"

"Glad to help. Just don't forget the maid cafe!"

"I...don't think I'm likely to forget," she admitted.


	9. Chapter 9

Nanase Saya squirmed her way free of the rose bushes with a rustling noise, then stood up, smoothed down her uniform with quick passes of her hands, and looked around herself.

"Am I early?" she asked in surprise.

Alice was sitting cross-legged on the blanket she'd spread out under the oak tree, already nibbling on her sandwich. As usual, she'd bought her lunch at the cafeteria rather than bringing it. She'd actually gotten into the habit back when she'd first moved to Mahoroba and her mother's Western-style lunches had been one more thing that made her stick out as "that foreign girl." Weirdly, one of the first things Miya had ever asked of her as a friend was that Alice apologize to her mother for rejecting her lunches. Not that it was weird to do—actually, when Alice had gotten older, she found herself darned glad to have apologized, since saying some of the things she had was pretty indefensible—but weird that a nine-year-old should have thought of it.

It was things like that that had made Alice if not necessarily _believe_ when her friend talked about past-life memories, at least suspect that she wasn't completely full of crap. Extra life experience was the kind of thing that gave Miya an added maturity that went beyond just good manners and self-control. Maybe it was part of the secret that made her "Miya-sama" even from the time they were children.

Alice thought that she could really use some added maturity herself at this point.

"I asked Arrow last night and Miya and Himeko this morning if they'd give us the chance to talk in private today."

"Is something wrong?"

"No...well, yes, kind of. It's just that we don't get to spend a lot of time together alone, and these past couple of weeks have been really bad for that."

Saya came over and sat down, slipping with graceful ease into a _seiza_ position. Alice could never understand how people could do that without tearing something important in their thighs. She liked to watch Saya do things like that, though. As defiantly as she sometimes clung to her Western heritage, Alice was also fascinated by the elegance and grace her _Yamato Nadeshiko_ girlfriend showed.

It was kind of funny, she thought, that Miya never had the same effect on her. Maybe it was because, as Miya's best friend, she knew that the ladylike elegance Miya showed was a skill ruthlessly mastered by the heiress to serve her purposes, while for Saya it went straight to the bone. Like when they'd gone to see Arrow's favorite metal group in concert last year, Miya had gleefully dressed up in ripped jeans and T-shirt and rocked out with the rest of them, while Saya had been a fish out of water all night—but had gladly gone along for her friends' sake anyway. And she'd had fun, too, despite being utterly out of her element, which was another thing Alice loved about her.

"I'm really, really sorry about that. My parents..."

"I understand. I wish you'd let me tell _my_ parents, though. At least we'd have some support."

Saya glanced down at her hands.

"I know, but...I can't risk it, Arisu-chan."

Alice reached out and plucked a white rose petal from where it clung to Saya's hair.

"It isn't a risk, you know. I mean, they already know I'm bi, and didn't even bat an eyelash. Not even Dad, and you know how he can get with me being the youngest _and_ the only girl." Alice's mother had to bring him up short sometimes when he started doing what she called his "sitcom dad" routine. "They just said they'd be happy with whatever made _me_ happy. Oniisan even said he hoped I'd pick a girl 'cause there was no chance Fred or Alex would bring home a hot sister-in-law. Mom nailed him with an oven mitt for that one, but you get the idea. And that was back when I was thirteen!"

"I know, and that isn't the risk I meant."

"Oh?"

Saya still didn't look up.

"I'm not afraid that they would be against us; I'm afraid that they would be too strongly for us."

"I don't get it."

"Arisu-chan, your mother is...not a very discreet person."

That was an undeniable fact. Alice was basically a carbon copy of her mother, only _less_ outgoing. Carolyn Ishida's family had been four generations from seeing Japanese shores and had thought of the place no more often than her college roommate had thought of Wales, until the Ishidas had moved there.

"You think that she might talk?"

"What do you think she'd do if people made slighting comments about Himemiya-san and Kurusugawa-san at the grocery store, for example? If her own daughter was included by implication in such insults..."

"You've kind of got a point," Alice admitted. In fact, it had already happened once, when she'd gotten into a good old-fashioned screeching match with one of the neighborhood housewives, Mrs. Teshigawara, about "the Kurusugawa girl's shameful behavior." Her mom had scored that as a win ("Everybody expects the weird foreigner to lose her cool, but that old biddy'll be getting strange looks for a week for going at it just as rudely as I did!"). "It's just that..." She reached over and squeezed Saya's hand. "I wish there was someone on your side, not just a bunch of teenaged friends but an adult who can offer a different kind of support."

Saya looked up at her, and there were tears glistening in her eyes.

"I do too, Arisu-chan."

Alice set the sandwich in her left hand down so she could reach out and pull Saya in for a tight hug.

"Just remember that you've still got me. I mean, if it's being with me that causes the problem, then at the least you have to let me help take the weight off your shoulders, okay? Okay?" she repeated.

"O-okay, Arisu-chan," Saya choked out, clinging tightly to the smaller girl.

"Good." She held on to the hug for about twenty seconds longer, then pushed back from it and fished out her handkerchief.

"Now, go on and wipe your eyes. I don't know about you, but I have no desire to waste our lunch alone together angsting over stuff we can't control! And besides, I'm getting jealous watching you."

"Jealous?"

"Yeah. You're just like Miya. You perfect Japanese beauties can cry buckets and not get a stuffy nose or blotchy face or bloodshot, puffy eyes or any of that! It is completely not fair!"

Just as Alice had hoped, her pseudo-complaint made Saya break into giggles, and by the time she'd wiped her eyes, there was a smile on her face.

~X X X~

"Eating lunch on the roof of the school. I feel like a delinquent in some manga," Arrow said in between scarfing mouthfuls of rice.

"The view's really amazing, though," Himeko marveled. They weren't just on the roof, but the tower peak at the center of the academy building, and since they were facing the front of the school it was as if the whole hillside fell away before them, leaving a spectacular view of the valley and nearly the entire town. "I wish I'd brought my camera," she added, framing a shot with her thumbs and forefingers. "Look, over there you can even see all the way to the ocean! And just imagine what it would look like at sunset! I could stay up here and take pictures for hours!"

"At least until the giant clock right behind us starts chiming the hour and you go deaf."

"Arrow-chan!" Himeko pouted while Chikane grinned.

"She does have you there."

"Fine, then you two won't get to see my next portfolio," Himeko huffed.

"Okay, but if I was going to give up my hearing for a view, I'd rather it be of the cute guys in Guillotine Kiss."

"Oh! My friend Hana-chan loved them! They're that visual kei/black metal fusion group, right? She was a huge fan of Takehito, especially."

Arrow grinned.

"Good taste, your friend here. Most of the girls go mad for Seven, but he's a little _too_ pretty for me. I like to know what I'm looking at, if you get me."

"This is why Arisu-chan and I are the smart ones," Himeko said, grinning. "We're happy with whatever turns out to be—"

"—If you say 'under the hood' I am turning you in to Alice for stealing her line," Chikane warned, smiling. "She said the exact same thing to Arrow once."

A thought hit Himeko belatedly.

"Oh! Chikane-chan, I wasn't saying that I'd actually want to—" she stammered out, holding up her hands.

"I know that, Himeko," Chikane said. "Do you seriously think I wouldn't understand you joking about a musician?"

"No, not that you wouldn't understand, but that it might hurt anyway?"

Chikane frowned thoughtfully.

"You might have had a point, before. I admit, I was insecure enough at first. But," she added, "that was then." She leaned over and gave Himeko a kiss on the cheek. Himeko burst into a happy smile while Arrow gulped at her water bottle to help her swallow the mouthful of rice she'd choked on trying to imagine Chikane of all people being _that_ uncertain of her ability to hold someone's romantic attention.

"So, anything good happen in you guys' lives?" she changed the subject.

"I heard a new one of the seven mysteries," Himeko piped up at once. "Sugimoto-kun told me about it while we were cleaning up."

"Cleaning up?"

"Chemistry mishap," Chikane explained.

"Oh? Yours or his?"

"Um...some of each? He used the wrong chemical and I turned on the Bunsen burner when I wasn't supposed to."

Arrow winced.

"Glad you're okay; that could've been nasty."

"Thanks, Arrow-chan."

"What was the mystery he told you?"

"It was something called the 'October Confessional.' It was kind of a creepy story about how a church appears out of a mysterious fog and forces people to confess their sins." She quickly summarized the legend.

"Oh, I think I've heard that one," Arrow said. "I'm sorry that I didn't mention it earlier; I usually only give it a thought in the fall when people start talking about it."

"It kind of reminds me of Sister Miyako, now that I think about it," Himeko mused aloud. "Though, if it's like the 'Ungrateful Girl and the Demon' and it's a reference to back then, shouldn't it be a church of Orochi or something? Because it's October, I mean? But then there wouldn't be an Orochi confessional, would there? You knew more about that cult than I did, Chikane-chan, and...um, Arrow-chan, why are you looking at me like that?" The tomboy was staring at her and blinking, looking for all the world as if somebody had smacked her on the back of the head with a trout.

"Himeko-chan..." she found her tongue quickly, since sitting around gobsmacked for more than a couple of seconds was completely out of character. "Where did you hear that name?"

"Sister Miyako?"

"Orochi."

"Um...isn't Yamata no Orochi a famous story?"

"Yes, but it's _not_ famous to attach the name immediately to the month of October. That's from a really old legend in this town that nobody knows about but the Ohgamis and the Himemiyas." She glanced at Chikane. "Did you tell her?"

Chikane could have lied and said yes and Arrow probably would have believed it. On the other hand, there wasn't any point to that.

"I didn't have to," she said. 

Arrow glanced between the two of them.

"Holy fucking A, you have got to be _kidding_ me," she took refuge in profanity. "Damn it, I should have figured it out years ago when you started talking about a girl from a past life you were destined to meet up with again, Himemiya." She looked over at Himeko. "You're the solar one, right? There's no way it's the other way around."

"Mmm-hm." Himeko blinked. "Chikane-chan, was I not supposed to say?"

"No, it doesn't matter. Arrow knows the story, so she would understand. I only kept it from my parents because it would complicate things too much, and it wasn't relevant to why I was talking about our past lives. And Alice and Saya-san don't know the legend, so it wouldn't mean anything to them."

"I should have figured it out," Arrow repeated, more to herself than the others. "Two girls, with a tie to Mahoroba, destined to meet again in future lives. I mean, it's only the whole reason our family even exists, to advise you two when you...oh, hell, Orochi's waking up this year, isn't it? That's why Himeko came to Mahoroba."

"We don't think so," Chikane answered. "This life doesn't..._feel_ the same as previous ones did. The malice of Orochi doesn't fill the world in the same way."

"So what, Ame no Murakumo gave you a vacation life?" Arrow was caught somewhere between sarcasm and shellshock.

"Maybe," Chikane said with a wry smile. "After all, divine mercy isn't just an ideal, and after all we've been through in the god's service..." The Lunar Priestess sighed, the weight of memories bad and good alike hard on her for a long moment. Himeko set aside her bento, reached out, and gave Chikane a long hug.

"That's probably why it didn't fall into place for me until now," Arrow decided. "The story says you two are supposed to be two _pure_ maidens, not two horny teenagers who can't stay out from under each other's skirts."

"Arrow-chan!"

"Arrow!"

She grinned broadly at them.

"There, got some of my own back. I'm guessing that story just meant 'pure' in the sense of 'haven't been with a guy' as opposed to a modern idea of what is or isn't a virgin, right?"

"Essentially," Chikane said, then gave Himeko a sly smile and added, "It's amazing, really, how many things one can do with another girl and still remain 'a maiden unpierc'd,' as it were."

"I'm warning you now, there's a firehose on the wall just inside that door and I'm not afraid to use it if necessary."

"It might be worth it."

"Chikane-chan! Stop teasing Arrow-chan!" Himeko scolded. "Even if it is cute to see you do it."

Arrow snorted.

"I wish Alice was here now. She's lots better at coming up with the wiseass remarks you two so desperately need to be smacked with."

"Just think what she'd say if she knew us while we were twins," Chikane whispered in Himeko's ear. Himeko sacrificed a piece of her favorite sweet omelet, stuffing it into her girlfriend's mouth to keep her from making any more embarrassing remarks!

~X X X~

Kisaragi Otoha, for her part, found herself enjoying her lunch much less than her idols. She prodded her food gingerly with her chopsticks, only occasionally finding herself motivated to take a bite while her friends chatted about last night's TV shows, a CD Kyoko wanted to buy that was being released at the end of the week that Misaki thought she should wait for the digital release of ("and why don't we get those right away like the Americans, I can't imagine..."), and Misaki's need for a new skirt that she wanted to go buy.

"Seriously, Otoha-chan, it'd look great with my black blouse, and I just have enough money to get it left from my allowance and part-time job. But the store usually has its sales at the beginning of the month, so if I wait I bet I could get it for twenty percent off. But it might sell out, and I'll miss my chance entirely, then. So what do you think I should do?"

"Hm? About what?"

"About the skirt. Weren't you listening, Otoha-chan?"

"You've barely said five words since lunch started," Kyoko noted. "Are you all right? You're not feeling sick to your stomach or something, are you?"

Otoha shook her head.

"No, I'm all right. It's just..."

She trailed off, glancing from one face to the other. How, exactly, was she supposed to tell the two of them what her problem actually was? That ever since classes had ended yesterday she'd spent her time getting humiliated by virtually everyone she'd run into: Oomori's friends, Ohgami Shizuka, and Alice Ishida. It was as if the rest of the school had entered into a conspiracy to give her as much grief as possible.

Ishida, she decided, had actually been the worst of the bunch. Otoha was used to sparring with Ohgami; the tomboy had spent years insisting that Himemiya was an ordinary girl and ought to be treated like such and that fan clubs and the like were plain nonsense, sticking her nose in whenever she found Otoha and her friends insisting that Himemiya be shown the proper respect.

_And wasn't the joke on me, there, _Otoha thought ruefully. It was utterly infuriating, but to have spent so long admiring a girl who would fall head over heels for a transfer student—a _girl_ transfer student, no less—well, Otoha wasn't surprised that Himemiya's fans would look stupid. She'd been infuriated by those boys, and yet could she really blame them? When a leader fell from grace, her close followers fell as well. That was the way of things. Were she in those boys' place, Otoha would likely have been laughing, too.

No, it was Ishida that cut the deepest. She hadn't _meant_ to mock or taunt—if anything, she'd been defensive on Kurusugawa's behalf (and why, exactly, did everyone seem to care so much about that simpering nobody, anyway?). It was the way she'd taken Otoha's honest question, something that had frankly taken her a lot of guts to work up the courage to ask, and had looked at her as if she were some kind of mental defective. It went beyond being angry or upset the way Ohgami would be; it was as if the mere fact Otoha had asked the question was so outside Ishida's experience that she couldn't work up any emotion beyond stunned bewilderment. The annoying little foreigner really _was_ that comfortable with Himemiya's sexuality and the idea that it might bother her was so alien that it was like she was talking to someone who thought the earth was flat.

As if she, Otoha, who had been Himemiya's most enthusiastic fan, had missed on something fundamental to her character, not the sexuality she'd previously kept hidden, but the much more basic question of her character apart from that. Something that Ishida had understood automatically, as Himemiya's _friend_.

For years Otoha had admired Himemiya's beauty, her confidence, her grace, her intellect, her poise, all the things that made her a shining star, a standard that Otoha knew she could never match but should strive to emulate as a goal none the less. Now for the first time, she found herself envying something intangible about her, whatever quality it was that caused Ishida to stand beside her as her best friend.

No, she knew, there was no point in saying any of that. It would probably fall on deaf ears anyway, which pretty much was why she was having the trouble in the first place.

"It's nothing," she dismissed it. "I just had to talk to Ohgami-kun about the Seven Mysteries article and she gave me a ton of grief."

Kyoko sniffed.

"That stupid bitch. She's supposed to be Nanase-sama's friend, but I guess that isn't enough to get her to properly treat you with respect."

The sheer irony of that statement in light of Otoha's inner thoughts made the blonde's gut clench.

"Did she at least give you the information you needed?" Misaki asked.

"Yes about the haunting of the groundskeeper's cottage."

"Oh! Yes, I remember that! For a while there, people were saying that the suicide's ghost kept haunting the place of his death. It was really big in the high school then," Kyoko chipped in.

"How did you hear about it?"

"I like spooky stuff," she said with a shrug. "That's when I was dating Tanaka-sempai, so he told me all about it."

Otoha remembered that Kyoko had been dating a high-school boy at the time.

"I never heard of that," Misaki said, sounding a little put out.

"Apparently it stopped being a big rumor not long after Shinonome-san was hired; he doesn't have ghost trouble, or he just doesn't care, or he isn't sensitive to spiritual presences," Otoha explained. "Anyway, when the guy who lives there stopped having trouble, it didn't make for a good rumor, so it kind of died down. I guess not a lot of people know it now, since everybody who was in high school at the time has graduated and the teachers don't pass on many of those stories." She wondered if that might make a good angle to discuss in the preface to the story, about how the Seven Mysteries were passed on by the students as part of the culture and tradition of the school apart from what was officially overseen by the staff.

"Ah, ancient history, then," she gave a little shiver. Obviously, Misaki was more than happy to leave the ghost story as something over and done with instead of in the present.

"By the way, did you hear about Arakawa-san?" Kyoko changed the subject. There was something sly about her tone of voice, though, which Otoha recognized. The brunette could never resist giving away when she was about to spring a trap. She went ahead and answered anyway, since Kyoko would just work her way around to her point in any event and this shortened the process of getting her there.

"No, what about her?"

"Well, you know how she's failing chemistry, don't you? And we're having a big test next week? So she left an offering of food for the science wing goblin last night to give her good luck on the test, and it didn't take it!" She cackled. "So Arakawa-san's been going around all morning convinced she'd going to flunk because the goblin cursed her!"

"C-cursed?" Misaki yelped.

"It's a double-edged sword, calling on supernatural powers, Misaki-chan. If you're not careful, you might end up dragged into the darkness by meddling too much!"

Misaki cringed back.

"D-don't be stupid, Kyoko-chan! I'm not surprised Arakawa-san's offering was rejected. Her cooking is as bad as her chemistry, after all."

"Quit teasing Misaki-chan," Otoha spoke up with a sigh.

"I'm just telling the truth about a classmate," Kyoko said piously. "If Misaki-chan is still scared of ghosts because of the Maiden's Oracle she cast last year that says she—"

"Oh, of course!" Otoha cut in. "Why didn't I think of it before?"

"Huh?"

"The Maiden's Oracle is one of the Seven Mysteries! A supernatural urban legend that the students know of and pass down to others year by year. That's the entire concept, isn't it?"

"Yeah, you're right," Misaki brightened.

"I just didn't think of it because it's more of a game than a story."

"It's not a game!" Misaki insisted. "It's real! Look at what happened to Izumi-san!"

"Izumi-san transferred schools because Himemiya-san sticks up for her friends and caught her bullying Ishida-san," Otoha pointed out.

"But the Maiden's Oracle predicted grave misfortune in her social future! If she'd believed the warning she might have been wiser."

"Izumi-san couldn't have been wise if her life depended on it."

"But no one knew how scary Himemiya-san could be, back then!" Kyoko protested.

"No, but Izumi-san was supposed to be Himemiya-san's number-one fan. If that was true, she should have respected Himemiya-san's choice of friends."

"None of us wanted to see our Miya-sama hanging around all the time with someone so inappropriate," Misaki protested. "Of course now we know better. It's no surprise at all the dyke, the butch, and the foreigner would be friends in their little freak club."

"And Nanase-sama?" Kyoko dug at her.

"I'm sure she's as shocked and horrified as everyone else with good sense," was Misaki's reaction. Otoha assumed that Misaki had decided to put Himemiya on the same level as Kurusugawa in her mind; instead of Kurusugawa "dragging Himemiya down" she'd rather "revealed her to be rotten all along."

"No, she's not," Otoha said, thinking of the conversation two days ago. "I think Nanase-sama might have known all along, or at least that she doesn't hate Himemiya-san for it. She's a kind person like that, and would want her friend to be happy regardless."

Kyoko nodded.

"That is certainly Nanase-sama's way; she's a kind and gentle person, a real lady. Of course she'd be gracious and understanding." She followed that up with an arch look, as if she'd managed to score a point off Misaki in some game being played between the two of them. Otoha wondered if they genuinely thought _she_ was keeping score of their petty one-upmanship, or that she even cared.

_And these are the people I call my friends_, she thought. She wondered if the Maiden's Oracle would tell her that someone or something was trying to give her a message, because if so they weren't even being subtle about it.


	10. Chapter 10

"The Maiden's Oracle?" Himeko asked. "What's that, Kisaragi-san?"

The Newspaper Club was busy after school, with various students hard at work. Some were drafting or planning their stories, while others worked on the technical composition or layout of the paper and still others dealt with advertising, distribution, and similar business matters. Saya sat at her editor's desk at one end, dealing with questions as they were brought to her, occasionally getting called over to one group or another. Himeko was pretty impressed by the amount of work being put in by the club members; they obviously took things seriously and put a lot of care into the school paper.

Seeing Saya handle things with a cool, disciplined ease similar to how Chikane ran the kendo team showed Himeko another side of the girl than she'd seen before. Up until that point, Saya had mostly just been a polite lunch companion or someone that Himeko had felt vaguely sorry for an account of her family situation. At no time had she gotten to see the intelligent, dynamic girl who was apparently very much like "Miya-sama," only in reality as opposed to being merely a facade.

"I guess you'd never have heard of it, since you're new here, and I can't see Himemiya-san and her friends going in for it. It's a kind of fortunetelling game where a spirit is summoned to answer questions—a local version of _Kokkuri-san_, you could call it."

"Oh, I've heard of that! My friend Kana-chan was really into that kind of thing for a couple of years, but I was always too scared to try."

"Well, in our local version, you write the character for 'sword' in the center of a piece of paper, then 'yes' on one side and 'no' on the other, and a ring of all the hiragana around them."

"That sounds like a lot of writing."

"Well, you're allowed to reuse the paper instead of drawing it fresh each time," Otoha sounded a bit defensive. "Anyway, then at one of the short ends of the paper you write the character for 'sun,' and the other for 'moon.' Then the two girls—and it has to be two girls, no other number and no boys at all—place a coin or something like it in the center on the 'sword,' and each girl puts one forefinger on it. After that they say a short prayer to invite the spirit of the god to protect them and answer one question for each girl, sliding the coin to yes or no, or spelling out more complicated answers."

Himeko was trying to work her mind around that one.

"So, girls in this school call on Ame no Murakumo, the God of Swords, to tell love fortunes and whether they'll do well on tests?"

Otoha's eyes narrowed.

"I thought you hadn't heard of this before."

"I haven't!"

"Then how did you know the name of the god that the Maiden's Oracle calls on?"

Himeko might not have been the most cunning plotter, but she realized that "because it's obviously based on Chikane-chan's and my lives as the reincarnated Lunar and Solar Priestesses" would not be the best answer. On the other hand, their talk at lunch with Arrow gave her an idea.

"It's based on an old legend in this town that Chikane-chan and Arrow-chan were talking with me about." _That's the truth, isn't it? _"The keepers of Ohgami Shrine know more about the original story because it's part of the history they pass down as shrine priests."

Part of Himeko wondered if she should be talking about this. After all, there was a reason it was a _secret_ legend: so that the Orochi didn't know about the importance of Ohgami Shrine and rush to destroy it. On the other hand, wouldn't the god Yamata no Orochi remember it from life to life anyway? And in their last two lives the Orochi had known of Ohgami Shrine's importance via Chikane and Minako...And if Chikane was right about their present reincarnation not being tied to the cycle of destruction and rebirth, then this information wouldn't matter because the Orochi wouldn't be around to hear it until decades or even centuries in the future.

_This is really confusing!_ was her frustrated conclusion.

"Oh, really? That's interesting. What's the story about?"

_I should have known she'd ask!_

"Um...well, a long, long time ago, the gathered malice and despair of the people of the world grew so strong that it gained a will of its own, which became the _kami_ of darkness and destruction, Yamata no Orochi, which itself was made up of eight lesser gods, for chaos and suffering and hatred have many faces. The craving to impose one's will on others, the despair of faith betrayed, the rage of unbridled anger, the pain of shattered hopes, the frustration of a soul enslaved, the suffering of victimization, the futility of a noble spirit wasted, and the twisted malice of the betrayer all were part of the eight-headed demon. At first, the dark god could only seethe powerlessly, but in the tenth month, _Kannazuki_, the gods turned their backs on the world to gather in Izumo, and Yamata no Orochi was let free to ravage and destroy."

Himeko barely noticed that she had dropped into an almost prayerful attitude as she'd started to tell the story: head down, eyes closed, even her hands clasped.

"The land was set aflame, the seas boiled, the earth shook, and everywhere, everywhere people died. They begged for the gods to save them from Orochi, but whether bound by divine law or believing humanity had wrought its own fate, the gods allowed their pleas to go unheard.

"Except for one.

"The brave and mighty Susanoo no Mikoto was the hero of the gods, who had slain many monsters and demons, and by its long association with him his sword Ame no Murakumo no Tsurugi had become a _kami_ of its own. Its heart of steel was touched by the souls of two pure maidens who were willing to offer their blood, their innocence, their very lives in sacrifice for the world's salvation, and it thought to itself, 'I am not a god; I am but a sword, and thus I am not bound to follow the law of _Kannazuki_.' Thus Ame no Murakumo descended to Earth and delivered itself into the hands of the two maidens. For thirty days and nights they fought Yamata no Orochi, until at last the demon fell, and they sealed its dark spirit beneath a shrine on the surface of the moon, so it could not work its corruption on the living world.

"However, the rampage of Orochi had left the world in ruins, and it was necessary to restore it. Therefore, the maidens made one last sacrifice, binding their souls eternally to Ame no Murakumo as its _miko_, Priestesses of the Sun and Moon, and awakened within the sword the power of a true god. Thus, the world was remade, and Ame no Murakumo stands forever in silent watch over the sealed demon, for in time the malice and despair of humankind may again mount beyond their ability to control it, and call forth so strongly that it shall break the chains that bind Yamata no Orochi, and it shall descend into its vessels to bring about an end to the world. Then will the Solar Priestess and Lunar Priestess be reborn, to once again wield Ame no Murakumo in their eternal battle to hold back the darkness that we would visit upon ourselves."

Himeko opened her eyes and looked around as she reached the end of her tale, then found herself looking down again, blushing, as she discovered that she'd attracted an audience.

"I...I'm sorry! I didn't mean to disturb everyone's work!"

"It's bad manners to apologize for being cool enough to serve as a distraction, Kurusugawa-san," one boy said.

"What? But I wasn't—"

"That was a great story! Does it really have to do with our town?" someone else asked.

"Did Ohgami-kun tell it to you?"

"You're a really good storyteller, Kurusugawa-san!"

"I—I'm not—" _I don't even know where that came from!_ It wasn't a memory; she didn't actually remember that far back. It was more like the story had come bubbling up out of her heart, whole and complete, and she wondered if it was the truth of how their story had begun or just an amalgamation of reality with her own impressions and bits of different versions of the legend she'd heard—or misheard—over her lifetimes. It _felt_ right to Himeko, but that might have been because it was true or because it had been built up _by _her in accordance with her own feelings instead of harsh facts.

_I wonder if Chikane-chan knows a different version, or if she would tell it the same way._

"Now, now, everyone, we all have work to do," Saya stepped in before things got too uncomfortable for Himeko. "Kisaragi-san, perhaps you could use some of that in the part of your story discussing the Maiden's Oracle, and perhaps you could add a picture of Ohgami Shrine, Kurusugawa-san?"

"Thank you, Nanase-_buchou_," Otoha said.

The crowd cleared quickly at Saya's words, and Himeko and Otoha turned back to their notes. Or at least they did after Otoha gave Himeko a long, measuring look.

"You're never quite what I expect, Kurusugawa-san," she murmured. Himeko supposed that was only reasonable; when she did things like that she wasn't what _she_ expected, either.

"I'm sorry?" she ventured. Apparently this was not the right response because Otoha just looked at her and shook her head.

"Anyway, let's see what we've got so far as gathering the stories of the Seven Mysteries. I'd like to start writing them so I can give Nanase-_buchou_ a draft copy of the story. I'm sure she has plans for how much space to give it in the paper."

"Okay! I've been asking around, too. I didn't know how many stories this school had. It's kind of neat!" She found it especially interesting since these urban legends were new stories, ones that hadn't existed in her previous lifetimes even though she'd attended Ototachibana Academy.

"So that's the Maiden's Oracle," Otoha began. "And the one I told you about, 'The Ungrateful Girl and the Demon.'"

"Arisu-chan told me about the 'Haunted Rose Garden' and Oomori-sempai about the 'Hungry Goblin.'"

"There's the 'Thirteenth Step,' about the basement stairs, and the 'Weeping Lady.'"

"What's that one?" Himeko hadn't heard of it, so Otoha told her the story of the library ghost. Maybe it was telling it out loud that did it, because the significance of the story hit them both at once.

"Ah! Higashiyama-sensei!" Otoha gasped. "That nook is the same place where she was caught with Kojima-san! She's probably who inspired the story, when someone overheard her."

"Crying because the man she loved had killed herself over their doomed love. It's sad, but, really kind of romantic."

"Or over her lost job," Otoha gave a cynical counterpoint to Himeko's idea.

"But what about the rose petals? If she was holding a flower, then she wouldn't have been thinking about work. Oh, oh, and Kojima-san was the groundskeeper, so taking care of the rose garden would have been one of his jobs!"

"Okay, you're probably right," Otoha frowned. "I don't like this. I mean, the story of those two is tied up in two of the mysteries, the 'Weeping Lady' and the 'Haunted Cottage' that Ohgami-kun had Himemiya-san tell us about. I'll have to at least allude to some of the facts of their romance without going into sordid details if I'm going to be able to make any explanation at all about the backgrounds of the stories."

"Wow, I'm glad I just have to take the pictures. I'd be lousy at writing the story."

Otoha gave her a funny look.

"You can say that after you just told that story about the miko and Yamata no Orochi?"

Himeko waved her hands in protest. "That was different! I'm not usually very good at telling stories!"

"Really?"

"I don't do well when I have to talk to people, when there's a lot of them or it's really important. I get nervous and embarrassed and trip over my tongue." She didn't quite know why she wanted to assure Otoha of that, but she found that she did nonetheless. Maybe it was because she didn't want the other girl to think that she was bragging, or maybe just that Otoha had seemed like she'd liked Chikane a lot—a fan club was silly, of course, but her admiration had seemed genuine—and it felt like the strength of those feelings gave her some kind of right to know the sort of person Chikane had chosen? Translating her emotions into words wasn't exactly Himeko's best suit, but that seemed to be approximating the kind of thing she was feeling.

"Hm." Otoha tapped her pen on the desk a couple of times, then shrugged and changed the subject. "Well, anyway, is that all of them, then?"

"Oh, no, Sugimoto-kun told me about another one when we were, um, cleaning up the chemistry lab."

"Yeah, I heard about that. We had chemistry in the afternoon and Fujieda-sensei made sure to warn us about what _not_ to do."

Himeko let out a depressed sigh. One of these lifetimes she was not going to be such a klutz, darn it!

"Of course, that didn't stop Miyazaki Ryuunoske from making an even bigger mess when he was waving his arms around and knocked over a whole rack of chemicals," Otoha added with a sly grin.

"He wasn't hurt, was he?"

"Only his lab grade. His pride would have been, but he has too much of it to notice the damage."

Himeko couldn't help but return the grin. She didn't know the boy, but it was a good feeling to not be alone in her clumsiness!

"But anyway, you said that Sugimoto-kun told you another story?"

"Mmm-hm. It was a creepy one, too, about the 'October Confessional.' And Chikane-chan and Arrow-chan said at lunch that they'd heard of it, too."

"So have I; it gets a lot of talk around the time of the fall culture festival. But this is impossible, Kurusugawa-san."

"What is?"

"There are apparently _eight_ of the Seven Mysteries."

"Ehhhh?" Himeko counted them off one by one on her fingers. "That can't be right!" She ran through them again, but while she was not as good as any of her friends at math her problems did not prevent her from counting to eight without incident. "But there are always seven mysteries. That's one of the rules!"

"Isn't it also one of the rules that no one is allowed to know all of them?" Otoha pointed out.

"You mean, you think we'll be cursed, too?" Hopefully being the Shrine Maiden of the Sun would allow her to fight against other kinds of supernatural evil...

That did not appear to be where Otoha was going with the topic. At least that was the impression Himeko got from the facepalm her comment evoked.

"No, Kurusugawa-san, I mean that no one has ever before sat down and compiled a list of what are or aren't the 'Seven Mysteries.' As there's no fixed list, how do we really know that there's seven? Maybe there's eight, or ten, or two dozen. It probably changes over time, too. After all, the 'Weeping Lady' and the 'Haunted Cottage' both are from three years ago. And if some stories have explanations—"

"Like the 'Haunted Rose Garden'?"

"—then maybe they stop being mysteries once they're solved." She paused, catching what Himeko was saying. "Did you just say that the 'Haunted Rose Garden has an explanation?"

_Meep!_ Himeko thought, as she'd realized she'd blown three lifetimes' worth of secrecy. _I don't think Chikane-chan and the others would want me to tell Kisaragi-san about it, either. And they're probably right. I mean, it could be okay, but she might do something nasty like tell the school about the gap in the hedge if she was mad at me. Chikane-chan's fans can be pretty scary in any life, after all!_

"Um, er..." she stammered. "Well, I mean, it's a garden, isn't it, and voices are usually people, so maybe that's it?"

Otoha gave her a gimlet-eyed stare, obviously not believing her. Which was only to be expected because Himeko was an abysmal liar. About the only way she could tell a falsehood believably was to avoid the entire topic of conversation.

"In other words, this is something Himemiya-san told you in confidence," she sighed.

Himeko didn't answer, but then, it wasn't like she had to.

"Anyway," Otoha said, waving it off, "my point is, there's no master list somewhere of the Seven Mysteries of Ototachibana Academy. If there's an urban legend with supernatural overtones, people'll talk about it as if it's one of the mysteries. We may be the first people to have done something along these lines."

"Then how do we decide what ones to include?"

"Why not all of them?"

Himeko blinked.

"But..." She trailed off, not quite sure what it was she was protesting. Otoha, meanwhile, leaned forward, warming to her theme.

"That's the point, you see? The story will tell how there are more than seven mysteries, and we'll present what we know about how some of them got started, and...well, we can go from there. Maybe we can even run a poll by which the students of the academy _choose_ which seven to call the Seven Mysteries!"

"You're really excited about this, Kisaragi-san!"

"Of course I am! This is an important project; I've never done an investigative story before, and I want to show Nanase-sama that I can do a good job with it, both in collecting the information and writing an interesting piece that people want to read. It might just be a 'fluff' story that's for human interest instead of hard news, but it's still worth taking seriously."

"I'm sorry; I didn't mean that I thought you weren't serious. I was just surprised, that's all. I thought—" Himeko broke off sharply, belatedly realizing that what she'd been about to say would not have been considered flattering by any measure of the word. "I'm sorry," she repeated lamely.

Otoha gave her a suspicious glance.

"You apologize a lot, don't you, Kurusugawa-san?"

"Um, yeah." She rubbed the back of her head in a sheepish gesture, her hand avoiding her bow by long practice. "Chikane-chan always tells me it's a bad habit, and I'm honestly trying to work on it, but it's kind of hard when I really do do things that are my fault like break something or go babbling out something that I shouldn't."

The drill-curled blonde gave her a long, searching look. Her fingers had clenched tightly around her pen to the point that her hand was shaking slightly, but she didn't seem angry to Himeko. Of course, Himeko was not very good at reading the subtleties of people's moods when those people weren't Chikane, so she couldn't be certain, but Otoha really didn't seem angry to her. It wasn't like the times Otoha and her friends had confronted and tried to intimidate Himeko—then, they'd seemed genuinely mad that Himeko had taken up with "their" Miya-sama. This really felt different, like whatever it was _involved_ Himeko but wasn't _at_ Himeko.

Himeko didn't think she'd done anything wrong this time, and like she'd just said, Chikane didn't want her to be apologizing so much (though really, _somebody_ had to now and again; the old Chikane was capable of doing something really awful and not feel apologetic towards anyone _but_ Himeko, although this new Chikane definitely seemed different in that regard). So she didn't apologize to Otoha for whatever had made her upset. Even so, she wished that she could ask the other girl what was wrong. At first, Himeko had thought that she was like so many of Chikane's fangirls in this and other lives. It was only natural that someone like Chikane would _have_ fans, after all; if anything Himeko thought Chikane was even _more_ amazing because of how she could be who she was despite all the burdens she carried, the things only Himeko knew.

But the kind of devotion the fangirls showed...it was actually kind of sad, to be so lost in another person in a completely one-sided way, without actually knowing her as a human being or being accepted by her. Admiration that crossed that kind of line just made Himeko pity them.

Their first conversation about the story hadn't done much to convince Himeko otherwise. But in the last few days something seemed to have changed, or else Himeko was getting to see something that she hadn't been able to before. Otoha might have been a fangirl, but she was more than _just_ a fangirl.

_People can be so complicated!_ Himeko marveled. Then she blinked, realizing that Otoha was still staring at her.

"Um...did you say something that I didn't hear?" Himeko guessed.

Otoha stared at her again, then completely gave up and giggled.

~X X X~

"She laughed?" Arrow boggled. "You mean, a genuine, for-real laugh, not laughing _at_ you like she's the high queen of rich bitches and you're something the dog left on the rug? 'Cause I've seen _that_ laugh from her before."

"The high queen of what, Arrow?" Chikane asked mildly. She'd given her four friends a ride home in one of her family's limousines; even Saya had accepted despite the fact that her parents would probably make noise, since the newspaper club activities had run late.

"_As if_, Himemiya. We all know who the real queen is," she said, grinning unrepentantly.

"Guess we're lucky we're ordinary working-class folks, huh, Himeko?" Alice joked. "What with our Arrow's straight shot against her own social class."

"Anyway, was that it?" Arrow asked.

"Was what it?"

"I think she means Kisaragi-san's laugh, Kurusugawa-san."

"Oh, no, that wasn't it at all. She really did giggle."

"Wow," Arrow said, shaking her head. "She sounds almost like a normal human being."

Alice reached over and ruffled her friend's hair. Since Arrow wore hers short, the move turned it into something rather mop-like.

"Hey!"

"For being so cynical. That's Miya's job."

"Why do you think we get along so well?" Arrow shot back, making the other three girls laugh at their antics.

"In any case," Saya stepped in, "I know that Kisaragi-san can be a bit intense sometimes in her fannishness, but I've always knows her to take her Newspaper Club assignments seriously."

"She does have incentive," Alice noted. "I mean, I always take kissing you seriously. I think the same logic applies."

Saya blushed a faint rose-pink.

"I'm more interested in the results," Arrow said. "Eight mysteries, huh? That seems kind of appropriate for this town."

"Do you mean Yamata no Orochi?" Himeko asked.

"It would be interesting if, for example, each of the eight stories corresponded in some way to the attributes associated with the lesser Orochi gods," Chikane speculated. "But while that might hold together for a few—'The Ungrateful Girl and the Demon' for Take no Yamikazuchi, 'The October Confessional' for Yatsu no Onokoshizuchi—the metaphor falls apart fairly quickly after that. Which, I must say, isn't a bad thing. Signs of Orochi's presence are absolutely _not_ something that I would want to see."

"No argument there!"

"Do you have any idea what they're talking about?" Alice asked Saya and Himeko.

"It sounds like a certain Shinto legend," Saya remarked.

"An old story we were talking about at lunch," Chikane answered. Apparently she wasn't going to bother explaining the story to the girls who didn't have any background with the _Kannazuki no Miko_ legend.

"Ah!" Saya suddenly realized. "It's not what I was thinking of, but the Orochi story you told Kisaragi-san at the club meeting, Kurusugawa-san? I didn't hear most of it, so I didn't realize at first."

Chikane gave Himeko a curious look, obviously wondering just why she'd come out with it.

"Kisaragi-san told me about the Maiden's Oracle, and I recognized the symbolism."

"Oh, I see," Chikane said.

"Well, I don't," Alice chimed in.

"I'll tell you later," Arrow and Chikane said at once.

"Okay, but if you don't, my revenge will be awe-inspiring!" the redhead riposted, which set everyone to laughing again.

"Anyway," Arrow was the first to start talking, "I'm more interested in those eight mysteries. I mean, the stuff Kisaragi was talking about's a good reason why it shouldn't add up, but it still seems weird."

"Then it seems to me more explanation is necessary!" Alice declared.

"Eh?"

"Five innocent young maidens, pitting their wits and their purity against the forces of supernatural evil!"

"I don't get it," Himeko admitted.

"Neither do the rest of us," her girlfriend said.

Alice sighed.

"You people have no imagination."

"We don't have to," Chikane teased. "We have you to be imaginative for us."

"That's true enough. Anyway, tomorrow's Saturday, right?"

"Unless the calendar's gone wonky, yes," Arrow confirmed.

"Well, then, I think we should get together and investigate these mysteries!"

"Do you mean, at the school?" Saya asked.

"Exactly! We'll slip in after dark and we'll check some of these stories out! It'll be a test of courage!"

"Oh! Those are fun!" Himeko said with childlike glee. "But how are we going to get in? You did mean after dark, right?"

"That, we'll leave up to our diligent student council president, daughter of the academy's major donor, and walking Get-Out-Of-Detention-If-We're-Caught-Free card!"

"You will, will you?"

"Of course!"

"And I'm going to go along with this because...?"

Alice was in fact ready for that question. As she'd said, she was the imaginative one.

"Because one, you'll have fun and you know it; two, you want to help Himeko and Saya with the story; and three...I have a secret weapon. Himeko?"

"Yes, Arisu-chan?"

Alice pointed dramatically at Chikane.

"_Give her the puppy-dog eyes!_"


	11. Chapter 11

It had, of course, been Himeko's idea. Saya was the only other one who'd even have thought of it, but she'd never have raised it in the face of what she knew would be her friends' strong and varied objections.

Chikane figured that Himeko was supposed to be the one who _did_ think of things like that. After all, the moon merely basked in its reflected glory, indifferent to what was outside itself, but the sun cast its sustaining light and warmth on everyone...or something like that. Her sun-and-moon metaphors could get a bit mixed when she got beyond the warmth Himeko brought to _her_ soul. Still, if anyone could be described as a Good Person, it was Himeko.

Arrow objected at once, of course, while Alice was right behind her. Saya pursed her lips and took time to think the suggestion over. Chikane objected as well, of course, which drew surprised looks from everyone _but_ Himeko. _Do they really expect me to just go along with whatever she says?_

Maybe they did. When it came to Himeko, Chikane was a bit of a pushover. No, if she was being honest, "a bit of" could be cut right out of that sentence. But there was a difference between being devoted to Himeko's happiness and being an abject slave to her every whim.

Mostly.

"Why do you think we should do that, Himeko?" she'd asked when Himeko hadn't given in at once. By the time she was done, Saya was fully behind her, Alice had switched sides as well, Chikane had seen her point, and even Arrow went so far as to say, "I'm sure we're going to regret this, but fair's fair."

Which was why the five girls found themselves on the Kisaragi doorstep, with Chikane pressing the bell. From an open window they heard a woman call, "Otoha-chan, can you see who's at the door?" and a moment later the door opened to reveal the drill-curled blonde, still wearing her school uniform.

"M—Himemiya-san? Nanase-sama?" Her confused gaze swept out to encompass the others as well. "What are all of you doing here?"

Chikane fell back on her best Miya-sama manner to allow her to keep her own feelings in check.

"Good afternoon, Kisaragi-san. We would like to invite you to join the five of us for an outing tomorrow evening."

~X X X~

Otoha's initial reaction was disbelief. Three weeks ago, an offer like that would have sent her into squealing ecstasy, the only question being if she could control her excitement enough to accept politely and squee after the door was closed or burst into an extremely embarrassing fangirl routine on the spot. Yet now, after she'd made more than one public scene about Kurusugawa?

The social animal in her suspected a trap. Yet that didn't seem right. After all, hadn't she been insisting to Misaki and Kyoko all week that Nanase-sama wouldn't be part of such a thing? And there Nanase was, part of the group extending the invitation. And Kurusugawa, too...she wasn't some kind of perverted lesbian seductress who'd come in and ensnared Himemiya; she was just an earnest little airhead, unless she was a world-class actress. And Ohgami...Ohgami certainly _disliked_ Otoha enough to do her a bad turn, but her style would be to just up and punch her in the face, not try some mean trick. Ishida was ridiculously good-natured; she might play a _practical joke_, but she'd only be _nasty_ to someone who seriously deserved it, Otoha was sure.

Which left Himemiya.

_My experience has been that pushy, aggressive busybodies tend to be reckless in rushing about and often have...accidents_.

Otoha swallowed.

"Kisaragi-kun?" Himemiya prompted.

"Oh. Um...would you like to come in?"

"That's all right; we need to be going. We wouldn't want to impose for something quick like this."

She didn't know if there was supposed to be subtext of _and I have no desire to set foot in your house_ or not. Miya-sama was too hard to read one way or another; only Otoha's own feelings were creating the expectation.

"What kind of outing?"

"Arisu-chan thought that it might be fun to investigate the various Seven Mysteries, after school tomorrow night," Nanase spoke up. "We didn't think that it was fair to exclude you, given the work you've been doing and that you'll be writing the story for the newspaper."

"Oh...but you said, tomorrow night?"

"We'll be relying on Miya for all necessary breaking and entering," Ishida said with a grin.

"Alice..." Himemiya sighed.

"What? It's the truth, after all." Ishida's smile was unrepentant.

"You make me sound like a cat burglar!"

"Well, that's a lot cooler than saying you're going to use money and position to get special privileges and keep us out of trouble afterwards if we get caught, isn't it? So in a way, I'm actually doing you a favor by _enhancing_ your rep for awesomeness."

Himemiya just shook her head, laughing. Even Otoha found herself grinning at it. She still had the smile when Nanase spoke again.

"So, will you go with us? We really hope that you'll be there to see it if we do find something."

It was that smile, she thought later, that settled it for her.

"I'd be glad to come, Nanase-sama."

"Great! Would you prefer to meet us at the school, or shall one of us pick you up?"

"Oh, there's no need for you to go to any trouble. It's not a long walk."

"I'll pick you up," Himemiya said.

"No, but really, that isn't necessary—"

Ishida snickered.

"Sorry, Kisaragi-san, but Miya knows the classic routine of 'I don't want to be a bother' too well to be taken in by an amateur at it like you."

"She really does," Nanase agreed with a smile.

"I'm guessing you taught her that?" Ohgami murmured to Kurusugawa in an aside.

"Mmm-hm!"

"It's...not something I think you're supposed to be proud of, Himeko..."

"Oh..."

"Well, then, shall we say eight o'clock?" Himemiya suggested. "That should give you plenty of time to be done with dinner."

"All right," Otoha bowed to inevitability.

"Then we'll let you get back to your evening."

"Good night, Kisaragi-san," Nanase added.

They turned and started back down the walk to where the sleek form of the Himemiya limousine waited at the curb.

~X X X~

Saturday passed in a blur for Himeko, the thought of the night's excursion keeping her from being able to focus too strongly on her classes, not that this was generally one of her strong suits to begin with. Still, she confided to Chikane, the Saturday-night test of courage did one thing very well: it was taking her mind off _Sunday_ night's family dinner at the Himemiyas'.

"I wish my parents had something tonight to distract them," she said. "They're really nervous about the impression they're going to make. Otousan, especially; it's bad enough to be having dinner with the parents of his daughter's girlfriend without it being with the owners of his company as well!" Kurusugawa Hajime's employer, Kamiyatate Pharmaceutical, was part of the Himemiya financial group. That had actually caused him trouble at work, as the initial thought had been that Himeko was drawing the Himemiya heiress into a shameful relationship. That pressure had ended when the Himemiya family was openly supportive of the girls, but it didn't change the fact that the Himemiyas were responsible for his family's well-being. Actually, it made it worse on some level, since it was their unexpectedly liberal attitude (especially for a thousand-year-old aristocratic family!) that had let him keep his job.

Chikane wondered if the Kurusugawas would believe that she and her own parents were just as nervous over the upcoming dinner as they were.

"Honestly," she told her mother, "I think the only person who isn't shaking in their shoes is Himeko's little brother Shiro. He's just looking forward to playing here with his puppy. Presuming, of course, that his parents don't make him dress up in clothes that he can't run and play in."

"I did specify that this was going to be a casual, backyard event, didn't I?" Himemiya Hayate looked up in surprise. Chikane's mother was an executive vice president at Himemiya Investment Bank, the financial core of the _keiretsu_, and had a lot of the same poise as her daughter, though with a better-developed sense of humor.

Chikane sipped her tea. The faint scent of roses teased her nose, which always made her think of Himeko and the way they'd met two lifetimes ago in the academy's rose garden. She wondered, idly, what their true first meeting had been like, and whether she'd fallen in love with her fellow miko right away or if it had been something that grew over time—perhaps even over several cycles. It was very hard to imagine a reality in which she knew Himeko but did _not_ love her.

"You did, and Himeko told me that she'd reminded her mother of it. I just have a feeling that the Kurusugawas do not hear 'invitation to causal family dinner' and think of Otousama grilling meat on the barbecue."

"You have a point," she said. "It's so irritating, trying to bridge the social gap, and it's virtually all our responsibility to do so. _They_ don't want to be seen as pushy, grasping people."

"They probably don't even understand why you and Otousama want to form a relationship with them at all."

Hayate smiled at her daughter.

"Well, when you've been telling us about Himeko-chan since the age of four, describing and drawing her right down to the bow in her hair, and then the girl herself arrives in person and you two do indeed start dating immediately, then I think I have the good sense to accept that the Kurusagawa family is going to be our in-laws one way or another, even if _they're _not ready to accept it as yet." She paused, then added, "Are you planning to get married after high school graduation, or will you wait until after college?"

Chikane did _not_ do a spit-take, but it was a near thing even for _her_ self-control.

"Okaasama!"

"Well, I would like to know, with regard to the planning, and the legal aspects could take quite some time to work into shape. There are certainly arguments for and against each position, but I thought if you and Himeko-chan had a strong preference one way or another it would save time in analyzing the situations." She smiled at her daughter, fully aware of the effect her statement had had and having fully intended it.

"We haven't talked about it yet. We've been too happy just to be together that we haven't talked much about the future."

"Well, I can certainly understand that. But even so, I'd definitely give it some thought. Your Himeko seems like the kind of girl who has dreams about her wedding day more than she has actual plans, but making those dreams come true will require logistics, tactical planning—"

"You make it sound like a war!"

Her mother grinned at her.

"And what makes you think that it isn't? Two families, each with their own ideas about the day, all the internal rivalries, the cross-family issues, the social ramifications of choosing the attendants, to say nothing of the seating at the ceremony and the reception. There's no surprise that wedding planners are able to command the massive fees they do to chart a course and smooth the waters...not to mention why elopement remains popular despite the fact that girls can pretty well marry whom they want regardless of their parents' opinions."

"Was your and Otousama's wedding like that?"

"You have no idea. Your grandmothers nearly got into a hair-pulling match over the menu for the reception. Of course, the stature of the Himemiya family only made it all the worse, since the wedding was therefore a social, business, and cultural event. Himemiya Financial Group's stock price dropped a point and a half when we announced that I would keep my job after the wedding due to conservative investors believing that this signaled Seiji was a weak man who would not have the force of character necessary to lead the company profitably." She smiled wolfishly. "On the other hand, we closed the deal on the Takeyama Electronics IPO the next day; they'd been deliberately stalling because their CEO had university ties with my presumed successor and would get more favorable terms in my absence. So yes, all in all, our wedding was ferociously complex."

"I don't envy you."

"And in this case, I don't envy _you_."

"Why?"

"You're a lesbian."

Chikane blinked.

"Do you mean, because various people in both families will be so caught up in their prejudices that they make the logistics worse?"

Hayate waved that concern off.

"Oh, no. Not that it isn't true, because it is, but it's something we can handle right along with the question of how your uncle has a virtual blood feud going with your cousin Michiko's husband. Come to think of it, your cousin might not show up due to her husband's conservative politics, so there's two problems that might cancel each other out. What I meant was, in modern society the wedding ceremony itself has been presented as the highlight of a girl's life, the bride's fantasy come true. The groom, for the most part, keeps his head down, says 'yes, dear' a lot, and tries to keep his mother from interfering as much as he can. But your wedding, Chikane, is going to have _two_ brides."

Chikane couldn't help it; she tossed back her head and laughed.

"Good!" Hayate complimented. "Keep that attitude and you'll do just fine. And returning to the topic of family conflicts and avoiding them, I think I shall give Kurusugawa-san a call. A bit of wife-to-wife discussion should sort matters out as to expectations, and I'd hate to have anyone embarrassed on either side. Well, any more than inevitably happens when your father gets together with a grill."

"I _like_ Otousama's grilled rice balls."

"...It must be the Himemiya bloodline that does it," her mother decided.

~X X X~

Saturday night was quite cool for a May evening; there was a brisk breeze that sent thin, wispy clouds scudding across the face of the full moon. It was, Himeko thought, a near-perfect night for ghost stories. Or for creeping around a darkened school building in search of the actual ghosts behind the stories. All things being equal, she actually preferred the latter. At least a test of courage could be begun, experienced, and _finished—_and if they got really lucky, they might even be able to find out what the truth was behind a story or two and make them not scary anymore!

"It's a perfect night for this!" Alice said with relish. "Is everybody ready?"

They all verified that they had flashlights and cell phones. Himeko was the only one who'd brought a camera other than the one in her phone, but then again she was the one in the Photography Club. She wished that she could have taken one of the club's cameras, to take pictures on film and with a low-light lens attachment, but it seemed kind of wrong to be taking school property for a semi-illicit activity (even if it was based on a club project).

"I have soft drinks and snacks for everyone," Saya said, holding up a plastic bag.

"Now that's a perfect example of why people call you Nanase-sama," Arrow said with a big grin. "Give it here; since you brought 'em, I'll lug."

"It's all right; they're not heavy."

"Then I won't even notice. C'mon, let the mule do her job."

Saya gave in to her friend's offer. Himeko, meanwhile, noticed Chikane keeping an eye on Otoha during the exchange, perhaps anticipating some sharp-tongued retort. The blonde didn't say anything, though, for which Himeko was glad. It had been her idea, after all, to invite Otoha, and she'd feel sad if that ended up cutting up everyone else's fun.

Honestly, Otoha looked kind of ill at ease, and Himeko couldn't really blame her. The five other girls didn't really like her; everyone else had known her for years and so far as Himeko could tell pretty much considered her to be a pain in their collective butts. Himeko herself was thick-skinned about such things, but even she had to admit that Otoha had largely been a jerk to her since she'd transferred to Ototachibana Academy. But the bad feelings had to cut both ways even if the fault didn't.

"All right, then, let's go," Chikane said. "Remember that Shinonome-san lives in the groundskeeper's cottage, so we want to stay away from there as much as possible."

"Is there a night watchman?" Alice asked.

"No, but there are locks and alarms, and there are surveillance cameras in certain parts of the school. Thankfully, they're only installed in the administrative offices, the faculty room, and the computer center in the library, since the point is to protect files and valuables, not keep a constant watch on the students."

"That suggestion gets made at least a couple of times a year," Saya observed, "but the student council always takes a firm position against it to the trustees. We don't want to turn into an American school, where the only difference between it and prison is that we're allowed to go home at the end of the day."

"I feel like I should be vaguely insulted on behalf of slighted foreigners," Alice said, "but I agree with you, so I really can't be."

"Just remember it and don't go near there, please," Chikane said.

"We shouldn't anyway," Otoha spoke up. "None of the Seven Mysteries take place in those areas, so we would be getting outside our purpose."

"At which point we'd deserve to get into trouble, if we just started wandering aimlessly," Saya agreed.

"What about the 'Weeping Lady'?" Arrow asked. "Doesn't that take place in the library?"

"Yes, but not the computer center, and it's supposed to happen at sunset anyway."

"Oh, yeah, good point."

"I'd say to stay out of the library," Chikane said. "Unless, of course, you actually hear something coming from there. But be careful, too. Experiencing the Weeping Lady is one thing, but running into a burglar would be quite another story."

They walked up the long flight of stairs that led to the academy building, then followed Chikane's lead around to the side of the building away from the gardens and the groundskeeper's cottage. She took them up to a side door, then stood on her tiptoes and peered through the window.

"What are you doing?" Alice whispered.

"Trying to see where the alarm panel is located. After the door is opened, we only have thirty seconds to enter the disarm code or it'll notify the police, and I don't want to spend the first fifteen seconds just finding the—ah! There it is." She slid a key into the lock, turned it, pulled the door open, and darted into the darkened hall. The dim glow of the alarm's lighted keypad was the only light source other than the moon outside; Chikane went over to it and swiftly typed in a six-digit code. The unit emitted a soft beep, a red light went out, and a green one came on.

"Looks like we're in!" Arrow said with a smirk.

"How did you find out the security code, Chikane-chan?"

"The student council officers can go in and out of the faculty offices without comment. I looked it up in the files when no one was paying attention. The key actually is mine; the student council has an extra set so we can get in and out of locked areas on business."

"If they give you keys, then why don't they give you the key for the alarm?" Himeko wondered, puzzled.

"The alarms are set at night, when nobody has any legitimate business being in the school, but the doors are often locked earlier, such as if there are club activities going on but the main auditorium gets locked up."

"Oh, I see."

They all had stepped inside to join Chikane by that point and let the door swing shut. She made sure it was re-locked behind them.

"So, how are we going to do this?" Otoha spoke up. "We're not all going to run around the school in a group, right?"

"That wouldn't be a test of courage at all," Alice agreed. "We should go by ourselves."

"Pairs might be better," Saya suggested. "After all, we are genuinely attempting to document any of the mysteries of the academy we come across, whether positive or negative, and it would be easier to do that properly in groups."

"And tests of courage are sometimes done in pairs, anyway," Chikane observed. "Legitimate purposes should trump the game element of this."

"You're no fun," Alice said. "You're also right, though."

"Okay, but no couples as pairs," Arrow said. "You're not taking Himeko off for snuggle time in a dark school, Himemiya."

"You'll have to come back on your own for that," Alice teased. Himeko felt herself going blushy, while Chikane just smiled, which made Himeko go even _more_ blushy. That, in turn, made Alice giggle, her mission as teasing best friend accomplished.

They divided up into teams with a quick bout of rock-paper-scissors, which ended up with Chikane and Saya, Alice and Arrow, and Himeko with Otoha.

"So where do we go? If we're splitting up, we should go in different places, right?"

"Saya-san and I will take the east wing," Chikane decreed, "since that's where the secured areas are located. Arrow and Alice can investigate the central section and new wing, and Himeko and Kisaragi-san can take the west wing."

"Works for me," Arrow said. "C'mon, Alice."

Flashlights clicked on, and the girls headed out into the school, footsteps echoing off the tiled floor.


	12. Chapter 12

The silent hallways of the academy felt almost like dark tunnels underground or passageways into the depths of some haunted castle to Saya. While she hadn't paid much attention to modern media growing up—her parents had attempted to strictly control her access to books, movies, and the like to insure that she was exposed to only classical Japanese sources—it wasn't possible to live in the world without experiencing it, and during junior high she'd realized that she had a definite fondness for the horror genre, in stories, books, and movies alike.

It had been fun, especially, to go on movie dates with Alice. There was nothing weird about a couple of friends seeing a film together, and in the dark they could snuggle close, hold hands, and not catch anybody's eye. Or at least that was the way it had been. Now, she couldn't help but imagine eyes on them everywhere, watching closely, examining them for any trace of what might reveal them as girlfriends.

She glanced at the shadowy form of Chikane next to her, feeling a knot of resentment grow. It just wasn't fair! Why did Himemiya have to get the loving, supportive family who not only accepted her for who she was but actually went to the trouble of smoothing over the troubled social waters to the extent they could? Not only did the Himemiyas not mind having an out lesbian for a daughter, but it was their influence that had intervened with the Kurusugawas and gotten them to ease off and at least _try_ to be accepting.

If Saya tried coming out, she was morally certain that her parents would either lock her away in some prison-like reformatory or asylum, try to force her to marry some man immediately, or disown her and throw her out on the streets. Possibly more than one of those.

Maybe in a while things would die down. At some point, Chikane and Himeko's relationship would just be a fact of life in Mahoroba, not accepted by many people but not unusual and therefore not attracting attention to everybody else around her. It might help if Arrow got a boyfriend, too, to help reassure people that it was Chikane and Himeko who were the unusual exceptions in their group, not the rule. Certainly Arrow would be glad of it if she could fall in love! But that sort of thing didn't happen according to plan—romance came at its own pace, and Saya couldn't count on relief happening there.

If she were older, of course, it wouldn't matter. As an adult, she could go live on her own and escape the entire situation. She'd probably have to change her name, but really, when had "Nanase" ever been anything but a burden to her? But that was in the future. She was still a minor, without even a high school education to her name or a lifeline she could cling to if cut off from her family. If she could just get through university...

_If_.

It was probably the biggest word in Saya's life just then.

She glanced at Chikane once more.

"I'm not going to apologize," the other girl said softly.

Saya gasped softly.

"No, I haven't turned mind reader," Chikane continued. "It's not hard to figure out when you've been boring a hole in the side of my head with your eyes, though, and when you haven't said a word since we split up into groups.

"But I'm not going to apologize. If you had any idea what I've gone through for the sake of being able to just walk down the street holding Himeko's hand, you wouldn't even think about asking it."

There was an edge in her voice just then, and not the kind of sleek, clean edge one would normally associate with Chikane. This was something harsh, something dark, something that hinted at what Alice had once said about Chikane.

_I don't know when, or how. It doesn't really match up with what we know, so maybe there's something to this past-life stuff she talks about, but sometime, some way, Miya's been hurt very badly and she's still carrying bits and pieces around with her._

And again, the evening after Himeko transferred in: _I swear, Saya, she nearly threw a party on the spot, like...like Kisaragi would if she learned she was going to room with you on our class trip. And just because she found out that Miya had a best friend._

The girl who prompted those kind of remarks, the one whom Alice said she saw beneath Chikane's surface, that was whom Saya heard talking to her now.

"I didn't ask for an apology," she replied. Recognizing that something was there was one thing. She still didn't intend to be intimidated by it.

"Maybe, but you're asking for something."

"Some consideration, maybe." She paused, then sighed. "An apology would imply that you regret what you've done, and you obviously don't. And you don't owe me anything, anyway, not about this. You've got the reaction of society to _you_ to consider, your career prospects, and your own family relationships to consider in coming out, and then there's Kurusugawa-san, the reaction of other students to your relationship, and all of _her_ coming-out issues. It's not like I haven't gone through the same consideration in my own mind before, thought for long hours about where, when, and how I would—could—insist on living my own life for who I am. The effect on your third-best friend's closeted romance is not a matter to take into account, or at least it's so far down the list that it would not tip the scales."

Chikane nodded, acknowledging that Saya was in a similar position.

"It isn't my third-best friend's romance. It's my best friend's romance," she pointed out, her sharp edges clearly not yet retracted.

"Your third-best friend's personal issues, then."

"All right. So you say that your own decision to _not_ come out is based on a variety of factors, but that how it might affect me wasn't one of them, The fact that Alice is being upset by it would be relevant because she's the one you're dating, but _my_ concerns as Alice's best friend _for_ Alice are too remote to weigh in on such a personal matter of yours. And in that light, you agree that similarly you don't have any hold on my decision as it concerns going public with my relationship with Himeko."

"Yes."

Chikane arched one slim eyebrow at her.

"Then precisely what are we arguing about, if you admit I don't owe you anything?"

"No, that's different."

"Excuse me?"

"I said that you don't owe me an apology. But there's such a thing as taking responsibility for consequences, too."

Chikane stopped walking.

"What is it that you expect me to do, Saya-san?"

"I don't _know_! I don't have any answers." The sheer absurdity of it hit a moment later and she broke into a smile. "I think that's why I'm angry, because there isn't any answer, not unless you can change my parents into different people or remake the world so there's no such thing as hatred or bigotry."

"I'd like to see a world like that, but I don't think there'd be any people in it."

"Except Arisu-chan."

"And Himeko. And they'd probably miss us."

Saya smiled again, warmly.

"Probably." She glanced around, realizing that they were outside the library. "I guess there's no sign of the Weeping Lady."

"She probably got scared of the Sniffling Girls out here and ran away," Chikane said, then offered Saya her handkerchief. Saya blotted her eyes, surprised to find that she'd been tearing up, then blew her nose. At least she wouldn't be embarrassed when they rejoined their friends by obvious signs of crying; Alice had been right about that. "Um, I'm sorry, Himemiya-san."

Chikane blinked.

"For what?"

"For being snappish with you this week."

The other girl looked surprised at that.

"They were your honest feelings, weren't they?"

"Of course they were. But I do regret getting angry at you about them, when you're one of the few people who knows my circumstances and is on my side."

"Ah. Well, I accept, then."

"Good! We perfect Japanese beauties can't be going around bickering with each other, after all. It's beneath our dignity."

Chikane snickered.

"That sounds like Alice talking."

"Yes," Saya said with a grin.

"Now there's a fact that always confuses me."

"Oh?"

"Well, if we're the 'perfect' ones, why are we always changing to suit our girlfriends' good advice?"

They were both glad Alice wasn't there just then, since she'd certainly have a pointed answer to that question.

~X X X~

"Achoo!"

Alice's sneeze echoed through the empty hall. Combined with the shaking of her body with the convulsion which caused the flashlight to jerk in her hand and send its light skittering here and there, it made for a surprisingly eerie moment.

Arrow, it seemed, did not share this sentiment.

"You're kidding, right?" was her reaction when Alice mentioned it.

"You don't think it's spooky here?" Alice said. "I mean, just imagine it...here we are, two sixteen-year-old girls, walking through an abandoned high school, deliberately seeking out the supernatural curses that haunt its shadowy corners, virtually inviting them to prey on us..."

Arrow cracked up, chortling.

"You are totally a mood-killer, do you know that?" Alice pointed out with a grin.

"Sorry, it's just, the idea of supernatural curses..."

"This is why your dad always has to hire part-time miko for festivals. Seriously, Arrow..."

"Totally different things. _Religion_ and _superstition_ aren't identical, y'know. The Seven Mysteries are just ghost stories. Heck, the one about the rose garden is about _us_ and remember what Himemiya and Himeko were saying about the classroom—"

She broke off suddenly, a weird look on her face.

"Arrow? Hello, Earth to Ohgami?"

"Wha—? Oh, sorry. I was just reminded of something."

"Reminded of something like the fact that you basically just made my point? I mean, the classroom thing is about Himeko in a previous life. Two of our friends are living, walking, talking examples of the reality of the supernatural and you're standing there pooh-poohing the whole thing."

"I stand on my previous point about religion."

"What, because reincarnation is a theological doctrine? I'd let you get away with that if your dad was a Buddhist monk, but as it is, I have to say 'Nice try.' So, Miss Skeptic, we'll just have to see if you can still be so blasé about things when you open..." She spun and aimed her flashlight with a theatrical pose. "_The basement stairs!_"

Arrow rolled her eyes.

"Oooh, scary."

Alice had to give her friend credit for backing up her words with action; she stalked right to the unmarked door, turned the knob, and pulled it open, revealing the open black gulf of a descending staircase.

"They really ought to lock this. I mean, yeah, it's a basement, but...it's not like anything good can come of leaving it open."

"Maybe the door at the bottom is locked?"

"There isn't a door at the bottom, Alice."

"Oh? That's not the way _I_ heard the story," she said with a wide grin.

"Okay, in the story, yes, but..." She sighed. "Why am I arguing about this? Let's just walk down and see."

"Don't forget to count the steps!"

Arrow laughed.

"You're incorrigible, you know that?"

"Yep. Everyone says so."

She shook her head and started down the stairs, counting as she did. "...Ten, eleven, twelve...Holy crap! Thirteen!" She looked back up at Alice. "Hold on; I'm going to count again." She went back up, counting again and once more reached the count of thirteen as she set her foot on the top step. "Damn, what's going on here?"

"Shall we go down and take a look?" Alice said cheerily. Too cheerily, as it turned out, as Arrow saw through her in two seconds flat.

"Okay, spill it."

"Spill what?"

"You tell me. But you were expecting this, or else you'd be completely excited right now over discovering that one of the mysteries was true."

"Darn," Alice pouted. "I need dumber friends. Maybe that's why Kisaragi hangs around with Mifune Kyoko and Ozawa Misaki?"

"Personally, I'd chalk it up to 'birds of a feather,' but you can always ask her when we get back."

"Nah, the moment would have passed by then. Timing is important for funny remarks."

"I didn't know being a smartass was such a technical skill."

"Oh, absolutely. Now, just being surly and disagreeable is more of a general setting, so that's why your own experience is confusing you."

"You're snarky tonight," Arrow observed.

"Yeah, it's probably because I gave away the game before you got...well, you wouldn't get scared, but all confused and flustery and complaining a lot."

"Oh, I see. Spoiled your own fun, huh?"

"Yeah. I'm just a lousy actress."

"Too honest. And you've spent nearly the whole time you've lived in Japan trying to be the reverse of someone who holds in their feelings and emotions."

"Kind of like you," Alice shot back, smiling.

"Yeah, except I'm not stereotyping myself as an outrageous foreigner." Arrow reached out and ruffled her shorter friend's hair. "So, anyway, what's going on with the stairs? You may not get to see me spooked, but you can at least play Great Detective."

Alice smiled at that.

"Ah, that's true, isn't it. And it's quite elementary, my dear Arrow."

"Don't push it."

Alice giggled.

"The solution is simplicity itself," she said, and pointed the flashlight at the open door. "These aren't the basement stairs."

"I figured out that part. Where do they go?"

"It's a Cold War bomb shelter. It was added in the 1950s, big enough so the whole school population, teachers, students, and workers alike, could hide in the event of a Soviet attack." She paused. "That must have been scary, living with the constant knowledge that if either the U.S. or U.S.S.R. got its panties in a twist, the whole world might go away in an eyeblink. I should ask Mom and Dad about it; now I'm interested. Anyway, that's why there are metal doors and that tunnel like in the story; the shelter is actually back up inside the hill."

"So how'd you find out about it?"

"School records and blueprints; it's not a secret. Usually the door is kept locked, but, well, while Miya was pilfering keys this afternoon I snuck up and unlocked it."

"That's why she sent us this way, to help with your joke?"

"_Miya_ play a practical joke?"

"She has lightened up some ever since Himeko showed up."

"Yeah, 'cause it punched a hole in her public facade and more Miya gets out. But she was never much like that with us anyway. So, no, that was just luck. I had a couple of excuses planned to switch it around if things went wrong, though."

"I see. And then since it's dark and we were talking, you just went a little further down the corridor to _this_ door instead of the regular basement door?"

"Now you're getting it. I figure that the day the guys in the story found the shelter, someone had left the door unlocked and they just went down the wrong one."

"It makes sense to me. Hey, I just thought of something."

"What?"

"The 'Hungry Goblin' story, it's about how the school was built over a cave into the mountain? Do you think there's a connection to the bomb shelter—even if it just got tacked on to explain why the goblin was coming into the school?"

Alice shrugged.

"It could be. I don't know if there were ever any natural caves or anything like that. Besides."

"Besides what?"

"That's somebody else's story to figure out, right? Let's let them have their fun."

~X X X~

Himeko wasn't at all sure that she would describe this experience as "fun." The major problem, of course, was that she missed Chikane. Walking through a creepy school in the dead of night, aware that there were legends about a creature that would come and devour offerings of food, was something that was best done in the company of someone she could snuggle up to! Darn Alice and her "no couples" rule, anyway!

She supposed that it could be worse. It could be a horror movie or something—like the time her middle-school art class had watched _The Ring_ and she'd had to write a _report_ on it so she'd had to actually watch, not just screw her eyes shut and ignore it. At least if a _real_ goblin appeared, it couldn't be any scarier than Yamata no Orochi...right?

_I'd be a lot more comfortable if I had the Solar Priestess Blade right now instead of a camera, though!_

Himeko wondered if Otoha was scared of ghosts. She certainly seemed to be in a strange mood. Though it was probably just that being on an outing with Chikane and the other girls was a weird feeling for her. Or a variety of several different feelings, mixed. When you got right down to it, Otoha's different emotions would probably take some kind of flowchart to properly diagram. On the other hand, it was kind of nice to see that, at least to the point that it made it plain she wasn't just a bully.

"Um, Kisaragi-san, I was thinking...is there any part of this wing that really shows how old it is?"

"How do you mean?"

"Well, the 'Hungry Goblin' story is about something that's been supposedly haunting the school for years and years, right? Because the school was built over its cave?"

"That's right."

"Well, I thought the photograph ought to show this wing like that, like something from a Victorian-era Gothic novel, or maybe something from the Taisho period would be better?"

"I...I kind of like that idea. It fits the story, too. Both of those periods were all about 'progress,' social and technological advancement in cultures that believed they were on top of the world and destined to keep rising, but of course now we can look back and see them as just steps along the way. Those are exactly the right kind of time periods which would push aside something like a local spirit for a construction project like in so many ghost stories."

Himeko stared at her. the idea of putting the photo in some kind of sociocultural perspective had completely escaped her; she'd just been talking about the atmosphere.

"Wow, you know a lot about history, don't you?"

"It's my best subject."

"It's my worst," Himeko admitted.

"Not chemistry?" Otoha asked dryly.

"Geez, that could have happened to anyone!" Himeko pouted. "But no, I'm lots worse at history."

"The wrong answers are just less volatile."

In spite of her nerves, Himeko giggled.

"What's that for?"

"You sounded just like Arisu-chan." _Or Marika-chan, or Mako-chan..._ Himeko's close friends in her various lifetimes tended to follow a pattern, personality-wise. Which she supposed made sense—she was herself in all her incarnations, it stood to reason that she'd be attracted to the same personality traits each time in her friendships, just as she'd always been attracted to Chikane as a lover.

"God spare me."

"Arisu-chan is a nice person!" Himeko snapped back. "She's kind and she's funny and she's really patient with Chikane-chan even though that's not always easy and she's trustworthy, too! She kept Chikane-chan's secret for years and—well, you see what I mean!" She cut herself off just before she blurted out how Alice had also kept Saya's secret. That would have been awful, since Himeko was pretty sure that Saya's fans were really high on the list of people she wasn't supposed to spill the beans to.

Surprisingly, Otoha seemed almost cowed by Himeko's sudden defense of Alice.

"I didn't say she wasn't," she said in a remarkably small voice. "I'm just not...I mean...Gah!" she finally exclaimed with a sudden explosion of breath. "What's wrong with you, anyway? I all but call you an idiot to your face and you stand there and laugh, but I say something that _might_ be an insult to Ishida-san and you jump down my throat?"

"It just sounded like you were teasing me about chemistry. Anyway, I really am bad at it, so it's fair to say." Seriously, Himeko had been insulted by much nastier people in her time, and when she'd had a lot smaller support network than she had now, not to mention a couple of lifetimes' worth of, not self-confidence, but at least self-acceptance. "But what you said about Arisu-chan was just plain wrong."

"All right, all right, I apologize!" Otoha flung up her hands in frustration. "Are you _anything_ like you seem to be, Kurusugawa-san?"

"...I get that a lot?" She pushed her forefingers together nervously, and nearly dropped her flashlight. Otoha just stared at her, and for the life of her Himeko couldn't figure out if she ought to find the drill-curled blonde's look of stunned bewilderment insulting or complimentary. Maybe it was a little of each.

Finally, she turned and pointed her flashlight up the corridor.

"The attics," she said.

"Huh?"

"The atmospheric picture you were talking about. Most of the interior around here has been done over with the usual school décor: tile floors for easy mopping, off-white painted plaster walls, all that. The attic over the science labs, though, are probably still close to their original design. Who remodels an attic, after all, especially if it's just utility access and storage spaces?"

"That's a good idea."

"I just hope the door isn't locked. I know Himemiya-san gave us the keys to the west wing, but if there's any more alarms, we won't know what to do."

"She said there weren't any others."

"You trust her to get it right?"

"I trust her with my life." What else could Himeko say, given the past? Still, her casually heartfelt declaration was apparently way out of place for an ordinary high-school girl, at least judging by the return of that bewildered look on Otoha's face.

"That wasn't really the kind of trust I meant," Otoha mumbled. "But I guess I can't see Himemiya-san being wrong about it, either."

"Nope!"

Otoha led the way to the attic stairs, Himeko tagging along in her wake. They weren't an extension of the ordinary multi-level stairwells that extended between the classroom floors, so first they had to go up to the third floor and then down another hall, around a corner, and to a second hall, by which time Himeko wasn't sure she could find her way out of the building if she had a map and a compass. They went up a narrow flight that ended at a door that, sure enough, was locked. The keys were labeled, though, so it was easy for Himeko to open it, revealing a large, cavernous space with angled roofs. The attic didn't appear to have been divided up into rooms other than the wall that separated it from the central section and the stairs they'd just come up.

The girls let their flashlights play across the attic, which was big enough that the beams faded out at the far end, making Himeko wish they'd brought more powerful lights. Dust was everywhere, suggesting that the place didn't get swept out very often, and there were even cobwebs in a bunch of places. Obviously the area was primarily used for storage; there were boxes, crates, and an eclectic variety of old furniture piled here and there in no set pattern or suggestion of organization.

"This place is kind of creepy," Himeko said. "You were right, though, Kisaragi-san; look around." She let her flashlight play around the nearby interior walls, showing their wooden construction, then angled the light up at the wooden crossbeams above and the narrow window that extended through the sides to provide light, obviously having been built in case the attic would be put to more productive use. "This is just the kind of thing that I was thinking of."

"Glad to help."

"We'll have to come back in the...um, is that the north or south wall?"

"You could look out the window and see," Otoha snapped. Himeko thought that was a good idea and took a couple of steps towards it when the other girl sighed heavily. "It's north." Belatedly, Himeko realized that her companion had just been being snippy again.

"Oh. I thought you'd gotten turned around, too."

Otoha facepalmed.

"How do you get through the day being such a complete ditz?"

"Maybe you're just not as good at being bitchy as you think you are?" Himeko suggested. Otoha just stared at her like she'd been smacked on the back of her head. It was a reaction that Himeko seemed to provoke a lot in her. After a few seconds, she shook it off, literally, with a sharp hiss of breath and a shake of her head.

"Why do you care which side of the building this is?" she said, obviously deciding that the business at hand was less likely to leave her dumbstruck.

"It's for the light, when I take the picture. Since this is the north wall, I'll need to come back in the morning to get the right lighting. If it was the south side, I'd take the picture in the afternoon after school instead."

"Oh, I see." Which sounded more like, "I have no clue what you're talking about but I'm taking it on faith that you have a reason that makes sense." Himeko was familiar with that particular use of "I see" or "Okay," from long experience of using it herself. She was about to explain with greater detail, but was cut off by a sudden draft that blew cold against her skin.

"Ahh!" she yelped in surprise.

"What was—" Otoha started to ask, then stopped mid-question. Himeko went ahead and started to answer her anyway, only to get cut off.

"I felt a—"

"Shh!"

Otoha held up her hand to forestall any further attempts to talk, and peered around, listening intently.

"I think it came from this way," she said, starting off into the depths of the attic.

"What did?"

"After you yowled, I thought I heard something."

Himeko tightened her grim on her flashlight and followed along.

"Heard something? Like what?"

"I don't know; I didn't hear it clearly."

"Maybe the draft knocked something over," Himeko suggested. "Or it could have been a creaking window. Are they casement-style? An open window could explain where the breeze came from."

"Like I said, I don't _know_, but it wasn't just a random creak or—"

She stopped, the beam of her flashlight pointing off to her right, between a couple of piles of boxes. This time, Himeko heard the sound too—a cat's startled meow. The slightly irritated expression on Otoha's face drained away, to be replaced by a sappy-looking grin.

"What is it?"

"I think I know why the Hungry Goblin didn't take Arakawa-san's offering."

Himeko came up alongside Otoha and looked where the other girl's flashlight was pointing.

It was a cat, all right, a grey with dark stripes wearing a slender leather collar. Ordinarily, Himeko thought it would have run off from the intruding humans, but the furry mob of kittens it was busy suckling had other ideas.

"I guess it had more important things to do," Himeko agreed. She was smiling broadly when she took out her cell phone to call Chikane about their discovery.


	13. Chapter 13

"So the cat belonged to the late Kojima-san?" Himemiya Hayate asked.

"That's what we think. Her tag had his name and the address of the groundskeeper's cottage," her daughter answered.

"The story you told me mentioned that he had a cat," Himeko added.

"I still can't believe that you girls went prowling through the school late at night like that," Himeko's mother chimed in. "It's completely inappropriate. Possibly even criminal, if the administration wanted to press charges."

"Which they won't," Hayate reminded her. "Your word 'inappropriate' sums it up quite nicely. I'm guessing Alice-chan had a hand in the planning, Chikane?"

Chikane didn't answer; she'd avoided responding to all the variations of "Whose crazy idea was this anyway?" that had been tossed in her direction since the necessity of bringing the cat and kittens to the vet's had made it impossible to simply sneak out and back home without explanations.

"That's a yes, by the way," Hayate told Eiko. "Though I have to say, it's much easier with Himeko-chan, here. Such an open and honest person is easy to read."

"You're kind to credit it as a virtue, but it would be better to not get into trouble in the first place instead of being too honest to hold back confessing afterwards." Eiko did not see Himeko's involvement quite in the same light as her fellow mother did. She gave Hayate a look of appeal. "Are you certain that there won't be any official censure?"

"Quite certain. The girls, or at least Saya-chan, Himeko-chan, and the Kisaragi girl, were doing something related to a legitimate club project; they didn't cause any damage or disturbance; and, well, the Himemiya, Ohgami, _and_ Nanase children were involved—the three most influential families in Mahoroba and the three largest contributors to Ototachibana Academy's school fund. Chikane does have good sense as to where the official lines are drawn. Of course," she added, "very few mothers have donors to stay on the good side of, and I don't find myself particularly awed by the Himemiya family's authority just now, do you?"

Eiko returned her smile.

"I must say that right now I'm not feeling at all cowed by them."

"It's probably the hat." Hayate waved her glass of iced tea in the general direction of her husband. While the women were clustered under a large patio umbrella at the picnic table where they'd eventually eat, the men were manning a large Western-style barbecue grill in the custom of husbands worldwide. Himemiya Seiji was completely into the process, wearing not only an apron but a puffy chef's hat. The Kurusugawas had not, it was true, been quite sure of how to greet this apparition, but now he and Kurusugawa Hajime were gleefully debating the best way to prepare a steak.

"I must admit, it wasn't quite what I expected from your invitation. It was very nice of you to call yesterday."

"Well, if you'd arrived in a cocktail dress expecting some kind of semi-formal affair, I think Shiro-kun would have been the only one in _both_ families not blushing like Himeko-chan. But with luck, in a few months we'll all have a better idea of what each other thinks and expects."

Chikane didn't miss Eiko's momentary startlement. Hayate's casual assumption that the girls would still be dating in "a few months" (that being the only reason why the families would be likely to have any kind of ongoing relationship) was not something Mrs. Kurusugawa could quite fit into her world-view. Hayate's smile increased by a fraction when she saw her daughter's reaction; Chikane was definitely a bit impatient after having waited her entire life, apparently for Himeko to show up.

But then again, Hayate thought patience wasn't one of the usual qualities of any teenager in love. Glancing over at her husband—whom she thought looked so _cute_ in his chef's get-up, the reason she'd bought it for him in the first place—she reflected that when it came to love, patience was actually one of the most useful tools for insuring happiness.

"And in the spirit of cooperation between families," she said to Eiko, "shall we settle on one week for the girls, Kurusugawa-san?"

"Well, if you're certain about there being no official trouble, then I think that would be about right. I think Chikane-chan bears more responsibility since she took many of the steps needed to get into the school at all—but on the other hand, she also knew what the likely consequences would be, which Himeko did not."

"I trusted Chikane-chan," Himeko said at once, which was very sweet but Hayate could have told her it wouldn't help her case.

"That's all well and good, Himeko, but as we discussed last night there is a time and place for it." Hayate could tell Eiko was aching to openly say something like "You can't just go do something that could get you arrested on the strength of the word of a girl you've known for less than a month!" but she couldn't due to the Himemiyas' presence. Hayate certainly would have in her place!

Of course, that wasn't taking into account the unusual bond between the two girls. Whether past-life memories or whatever else was the cause, it was quite evident to Hayate that more lay between them than just teenaged passion, or indeed more than true love. It was the way they relied on one another, turned to each other—they were holding hands under the table just then, in fact—and had an easy, absolute trust in one another that went beyond faith to the point that it seemed proven fact.

In truth, the people the girls most reminded Hayate of were her own parents and Seiji's, in the way that long decades of happy marriage had tied each of those couples together. Chikane and Himeko still had the interests, the energy, and yes, the immaturity of their age, but as for how they were with _each other..._

She was surprised that Eiko didn't see it. Or perhaps she did, and was just wrestling with trying to find a way to fit it into her own view of the world.

"Then," Hayate said out loud, "starting tomorrow, the two of you are grounded for one week. We'll expect you to come home immediately following club activities—no going out with friends, no stopping off for ice cream on the way home, no dates—and no spending three hours on the phone or the Internet together, either." She looked over at Eiko. "Does that sound about right?"

"Very much so, Himemiya-san."

Himeko raised her hand hesitantly.

"What about Chikane-chan helping me study?" she asked. "That's for school, after all."

"I think we can allow that...provided that the studying goes on at the living room table so we can be sure you genuinely _are_ studying."

"Or if Himeko-chan comes here, they can use the library...properly chaperoned, of course," Hayate chimed in. Though she had a feeling the simple fact of being able to be together would mean more to them both than any missed chances for kissing and snuggling.

The only difference in the girls' "Yes, Mom" replies was Himeko's -san versus Chikane's -sama.

"Good. And now that that's out of the way and the grounding doesn't start until tomorrow, let's get back to the mystery! We got a bit sidetracked when you were telling us about the cat. Chikane?"

"We're quite certain it was Kojima-san's pet, as I said. After that, things get speculative, but...since he apparently didn't have any family or close friends, after his suicide we believe no one properly concerned themselves with his cat. I suspect that she was allowed to run free somewhat, so she might not have been underfoot when the administration had his things packed up. If anyone took note of dishes, litterbox, cat food, or the like, they probably assumed that the cat had run away."

"I see. And it stayed around the school?"

"Actually, I suspect that it remained right at the groundskeeper's cottage as a source of shelter, and while doing so was the source of the noises and the apparent poltergeist effects. Kisaragi-san is going to interview Shinonome-san on the point on Monday, but she thinks that it was his remodeling that blocked up any crevices or holes or stuck windows by which she might have been getting in or out of the cottage. That ended the haunting, especially since he wasn't superstitious so if he heard an animal in his attic, his first thought would be _of_ an animal, not a ghost."

Hayate nodded.

"So the cat moved to the school building to better find food and shelter?" she asked.

"And started a new story, becoming the 'Hungry Goblin'!" Himeko finished up. "Saya-san thought it was neat how that story got going in just three years, but it seemed like it had been around forever."

"It's the high turnover of students in school. After all, it's the students who pass on these urban legends, and even if a third-year is telling the story, they only do have two previous years of personal knowledge. There's some crossover with the elementary and junior high divisions, of course, but not as much as you might think," Chikane explained. "Of course, the cat's actions might also have been conflated with an older story, as well."

"Indeed."

"So what's going to happen to her and to the kittens now?" Eiko asked.

"We took them to the veterinarian's in town."

"That could have been dangerous, holding a strange animal."

"We got a box, then Arrow and I put on coats and heavy gloves from the janitor's closet so we wouldn't get scratched," Chikane explained. "And _someone_ needed to do something."

"Anyway, we took her to a vet Arisu-chan knew so they could all be checked out," Himeko chimed in. "And Saya-san and Kisaragi-san will put something about the cats in the paper on behalf of the local animal shelter. Arisu-chan thinks that the story will help get attention for Goblin and her kittens."

"Goblin?" Hayate asked.

"Her name wasn't on the tag," Chikane explained. "The new one was a bit obvious, but..." She shrugged. "Maybe she'll bring her new owner good fortune on tests?"

"Do you think I should adopt her?" Himeko suggested playfully. "I could use all the luck I can get. Though Kuro might not like it if we got a cat."

"Get a cat? Ew!"

The speaker was Himeko's ten-year-old brother Shiro, who'd come running up to where they were sitting. His puppy, Kuro, trailed along behind him, panting happily; the grounds of the Himemiya manor house were basically a park and just perfect for a boy and his dog to run.

"We're not getting a cat. Your sister was just talking about a cat that she and her friends found last night."

"Oh, okay. So when do we eat? I could smell the meat grilling, so we came back."

As if he could hear the boy's question, Himemiya Seiji turned and waved to the families. "Dinner's ready! Come and get it!"

Chikane hopped up, then reached for Himeko's hand.

"Come on; you need to try one of Otousama's grilled rice balls."

"Can you make rice balls on a Western-style barbecue?"

"No," Hayate said with a grin, "but it doesn't stop Seiji from trying."

~X X X~

At least so far as the "dinner" portion of the get-together went, things had turned out to be a complete success, Chikane decided. Everyone was replete (or in non-Miya-sama phrasing, stuffed to the gills) with their choice of steak, shrimp skewers, potatoes, vegetables, and yes, the infamous rice balls, which Himeko's father had joined Chikane in enjoying, all washed down with iced tea, lemonade, or beer as the drinker preferred.

The ulterior motives were going pretty well, too.

"Everyone seems to be really getting along," Himeko said happily as she watched the two fathers work off some of the calories by playing catch with Shiro. The mothers were still at the table talking, while the girls had ensconced themselves under a shady tree on a slight rise so that they had a good view of the first hints of a golden sunset in the western sky. "Your mother had a good idea."

"I'm very glad about that. It's a lot easier to trust the relationship when you come to know the other family as people. And it helps to confirm to the subconscious that there's nothing strange about our romance just because we have a partner of the same sex."

"I think our romance actually is kind of strange, though," Himeko said.

"Oh?" Chikane asked. She realized that in the previous life, that kind of statement from Himeko probably would have made her flinch, afraid that it presaged some kind of rejection. It felt surprisingly good to be able to just sit back and be confident that Himeko didn't mean that being gay wasn't "normal."

"Well, we met centuries ago, and we've had lots of lifetimes together and meetings and partings. And I don't think a lot of people have fought demon-gods together, or had most of our important love confessions while one of us was dying and still got to do something about it afterwards." She touched her fingertip to her lower lip. "And there was the twins thing, too. That wasn't really normal."

Chikane chuckled at that,

"You have a point, I must say."

She shifted herself on the grass, snuggling closer to Himeko so that their hips and shoulders were firmly pressed together. After all, they'd be missing out on some of that snuggle time next week. She wondered what the other parents might do; Arrow probably wouldn't get punished at all, Alice would likely get the same treatment as Chikane and Himeko, Otoha she didn't know at all, and Saya...well, there was a reason they'd sent Saya home _before_ delivering Goblin and the kittens to the vet's. If the school administration tried to make a stink Saya would certainly stand up beside them at once, but with only parents involved...

"Speaking of our relationship, did you know that Okaasama was asking about our wedding plans yesterday?"

"Ehhhhh?"

Chikane giggled.

"Uh-huh. She was wondering if we plan to get married right after high school or wait until we're done with college, so she can start laying the legal groundwork."

"Seriously? She's on our side that much?"

"She believes me. After all, I've been letting my parents know about you since I was four. Plus, she likes you."

"I like her, too. Though she's so cool and collected all the time, I'm always afraid that I'm going to fall over on my face because I get so flustered. It's like when I first found out how important you were when we first met, except of course that wasn't when we'd actually first met so it was easy to relax around you because I could trust right away that you wouldn't be upset if I was clumsy or an airhead."

"Okaasama won't mind that either, you know. Actually, she'd never have married Otousama if he didn't have a goofy sense of humor."

Himeko looked at her in amazement.

"Your _father_? But he always seems so straight-laced and stern!"

Chikane arched an eyebrow at her.

"The same man who was wearing a chef's hat?"

"Well, okay, but—"

"He takes serious business seriously, and my love life is definitely serious business from a father's perspective. Okaasama tends to be more able to find the absurd even when things are most intense. The more Otousama gets to know and accept you, the more he'll relax and let you see that side of himself." She then changed the subject back. "So, do you see me in a bridal gown or a tuxedo?"

Himeko blushed.

"I...I think you'd look great in both. You'd be gorgeous in a dress with oceans of white lace, but you'd look really nice in a tux, too, and kind of...I don't know, edgy? Because it'd be really obvious you're a girl. Which is good, because I like you as a girl. Don't you have a preference?"

Chikane shook her head.

"I only have one wedding-day dream."

"Oh? I've had all kinds. I'm not even sure if I'd rather have a Western or Japanese ceremony. I mean, as a miko, I ought to have a traditional wedding, shouldn't I? But I just know I'd mess something up or drop something and probably make the gods mad at me, and besides, wedding gowns are so pretty and..." She broke off, no doubt aware that she'd been reduced to babble. "What was your dream, Chikane-chan?"

Chikane reached out and took Himeko's left hand in hers, cradling it gently. She then ran the tip of her right forefinger down the length of Himeko's ring finger from nail to base.

"I dream of sliding a wedding ring onto this hand," she said softly. Himeko blushed, glancing down shyly.

"Chikane-chan..." she murmured, then suddenly lifted her face and leaned in, her lips easily finding Chikane's. Her kiss was soft and gentle and it left a lingering warmth behind when they broke it off.

"That was so sweet, Chikane-chan."

"It's just how I feel. I love you so much, Himeko; getting married to you isn't really about the day, or how we arrange it under the law, it's about being able to stand up in front of the world and pledge to be yours alone, for all of time."

"I love you that way too, Chikane-chan." She smiled sheepishly. "I wish I could be so poetic about it." She reached up with her free hand and gently cupped Chikane's cheek. "You always know just what to say to make me glow inside."

"It's all because of you, you know. I just bask in your warmth and it makes me come alive. I can't help but speak in poetry around you." She returned the kiss, claiming Himeko's lips for her own again. Her lover's kisses were like water in the desert; no matter how many Chikane got, her desire for them was never sated. This time they only broke away when the kisses grew too urgent and passionate, Chikane's mouth flowering open beneath Himeko's. They pulled back, staring at one another, the naked desire in Himeko's gaze matching what Chikane was feeling.

Then they broke into laughter, bending forward so that their foreheads touched.

"Now _that_ would be ferociously inappropriate!" Chikane admitted. "Though the idea of lying with you in the grass, feeling the warm sun and the cool breeze on our skin as we—"

"Stop that!" A blushing Himeko swatted her playfully on the shoulder, and they dissolved into giggles again, before snuggling back together, Himeko nestling her head in between Chikane's neck and shoulder so that her hair seemed to stroke against Chikane's cheek.

"Chikane-chan," Himeko said quietly, "I'm sorry that you got grounded for helping me."

"It was Alice's idea."

"I know, but...you made it possible, and I know you only did it for my sake. You certainly didn't do it for Kisaragi-san's."

"Well, when you consider the things I've done for your sake in the past, which I believe you were just teasing me about on this past Tuesday, I don't think that slightly misusing my student council position for the sake of helping you with a club project will cause me a crisis of conscience."

"Silly Chikane-chan."

"I'm going to miss you this week, though."

"We do sit together at school," Himeko pointed out. "And we weren't forbidden to talk together or anything like that."

"True. I'm just selfish. I've spent quite enough time in my life _not_ being with you. It's time to try it the other way now." She ran a forefinger along the line of Himeko's cheek. "I guess you're just better at waiting patiently than I am."

"I do have more experience," Himeko agreed. The allusion to the times she'd spent sealed in the Lunar Shrine between resurrections made Chikane's heart clench sharply, only to relax when she looked down and saw that the strawberry blonde's face held a sweetly contented smile, not at all angsty or troubled by the past.

_It never seems to bother her,_ Chikane marveled. _Whenever she worries about the past, it's always on my behalf, never her own._

"It'd probably be against the spirit of the thing to skip class and sneak off together," she mused, "but I have a feeling we should tell Alice, Arrow, and Saya to eat lunch without us. It'll be just like old times, the two of us slipping off to the rose garden to be alone together."

"Only with more kissing," Himeko said brightly.

"And hopefully no interruptions by Sister Miyako!"

Himeko giggled cheerfully, then gave Chikane a quick peck on the cheek.

"Definitely not!"

She took Chikane's hand, then hopped to her feet, pulling her girlfriend up after her.

"Come on, let's go!"

"Go where?"

Himeko waved her hand at their families. Chikane's father dropped the ball and Kuro, who'd been chasing around after the throws, seized his chance and ran off with it. Shiro took off in hot pursuit, which of course just convinced the puppy that this was the start of a game of "chase."

Hand in hand, the two girls ran laughing down the grassy slope to rejoin the party.


End file.
